


upon the snow and sea

by naevia_nadia



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Action/Adventure, Arkanis (Star Wars), Arkanis Culture, Drama, Family histories, First Order Culture, Humor, M/M, Nonbinary Character, Political Drama, Political Intrigue, Pre-TFA, Refer to Author's Notes for Specific Warnings, References to Abuse, References to past deaths, Religious Symbolism, Religious Undertones, Romance, Some Misgendering, references to trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-19
Updated: 2018-07-19
Packaged: 2019-06-13 05:36:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 31,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15357408
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/naevia_nadia/pseuds/naevia_nadia
Summary: A recently promoted General Hux seeks political and financial support for a new theory of his: an engine powered by a sun.  But courting influence is not so easy among the First Order.  Kylo Ren, along with some of Hux’s personal lieutenants, seek to help Hux find his fortune among the rich and important patrons of Canto Bight.  Along the way, Kylo Ren will also discover new details surrounding Hux and his lieutenants.  Those that make the ‘well-oiled gears in a machine’ comparison of First Order officers very inaccurate indeed.  Most importantly, Kylo will discover the power behind one single word and why it makes the most powerful in the galaxy kneel before it.





	1. The Preface

**Author's Note:**

> WOW SO IT'S BEEN SEVEN MONTHS SINCE I'VE POSTED
> 
> LMAO
> 
> Can I say college has been my excuse?
> 
> But really it's been lack of inspiration...I've had lots of little ideas but they haven't really gone anywhere until this beast of a fic! It took me so long because I kept wanting to abandon it because the beginning wouldn't work or the middle was weird or I just couldn't get to the end!!
> 
> But I did it!! It's finished!! :D
> 
> I hope y'all saw the tags, so in case you want further specifics on some of the tags, please consult the end notes at the end of the last chapter!
> 
> Besides that all I can say is: I hope you enjoy this fic!

The door to Hux’s quarters slides open with a hiss, and immediately, Kylo hears the _mirp_ _mirp_ of a cat before Millicent comes trotting around the corner.  Her tail stands up in greeting.  Kylo walks inside, letting the doors slide shut behind him, and crouches to offer his gloved hand to Millie.

“Hi, sweet girl,” Kylo says as Millicent sniffs at his fingers.  She chirps again before rubbing her check along Kylo’s hand.  Kylo scratches her face briefly before scooping her up and standing.  He holds Millie against his chest and presses his face into her fur.  He can feel rather than hear her enthusiastic purring. 

Kylo kisses her furry head before heading down the short hallway into the living area of Hux’s quarters.  He’s breathing heavy from his swift walk over, not wanting to miss a minute with Hux.  It’s been a while since their dinner shifts have coincided.

As he crosses the threshold into the living room, Kylo inhales deeply and smells something unusual for Hux’s quarters: a rich, earthy smell.  Kind of gamey.  It reminds Kylo of the crowded streets of any city in the Unknown Regions.  Street vendors shouting prices for their foods.  Sitting on a hard stool and the cook sliding a bowl of something hot and rich in front of him.

Intrigued, Kylo presses on, still holding Millie who hasn’t started squirming yet.

He rounds the corner towards Hux’s small, yet rather extensive, kitchen and stops with a small smile on his face.

Because Hux is cooking.

And when Hux cooks?

Kylo’s always left feeling lazy and satisfied, like a big cat soaking up heat on a rock.

Kylo had been surprised the first time he saw Hux cooking.  It was something he’d never have thought to associate Hux with in the past.  But that what was Hux was like: he conceals himself, the little details and all, until revealing himself like it’d been visible all along.

At times, Kylo feels like he’s playing a game with Hux in their relationship.  Who can remain a mystery for longer?  Kylo knows he’s losing most of the time.  Hux is too good at keeping himself in the shadows. 

Kylo hoists Millie up so that she rests over his shoulder.  Immediately she digs her claws into his cape, but the fabric of his tunic is thick enough that Kylo doesn’t feel anything.  Her tail twitches and smacks Kylo in the face.

Hux looks out of the corner of his eye at Kylo, though his attention is quickly brought back to the cutting board in front of him.  He’s dressed in his normal lounge clothes: loose pants, a dark red sweater that leaves some of his pale shoulders exposed.  His hands are bare.  “You’re here earlier than I thought.”

Kylo walks over and presses his forehead to Hux’s temple.  “So are you.”

Hux leans into him.  “I had a couple hours in the rainy day,” he says.  “And I was in the mood.”

“My stomach thanks you.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” Hux says, laughing a little bit.  “Wait till you’ve tried it, at least.”

Kylo moves away, now only hovering over him.  Hux is holding a large knife.  In front of him on the cutting board is a whole carrot.  As orange as Hux’s hair and Millie’s fur.  “You haven’t disappointed me yet.”

Hux hums before he resumes his cutting.  His fingers curl around the carrot as his other hand quickly chops it in small slivers.  Then, he flips the strips around and slices them again, reducing them to small cubes.  Hux lifts the knife and slides the rest of the carrot off the blade with his hand. 

“It’s called dicing,” Hux says, answering Kylo’s unvoiced question.

“It looks like you’re going to slice your hand off,” Kylo says.

“Some of us didn’t grow up with a droid cook, you know,” Hux says, teasing.

Kylo responds by biting at Hux’s ear before moving away before Hux can swat him.

On his shoulder, Millicent starts squirming, and before she bites at his tunic, Kylo lets her jump down from his shoulder.  She lands with a graceful thump before looking up at Kylo reproachfully.  Then, she looks at Hux with clear adoration in her eyes before she rubs against Hux’s legs with a meow.

“These are _carrots_ , Millie,” Hux explains.  “You don’t like carrots.”

Millicent meows again.

“Even if they are orange,” Hux says under his breath.

Kylo snorts.  “What can I do to help?”

Hux lifts the cutting board before sliding the diced carrots into the big pot on the stove.  Apparently he’s making some kind of stew, and by the smell, Kylo knows it’s going to be delicious.  “Hmm?  Oh, can you get the brown package in the living room?  It’s on the caf table.” 

Kylo nods before going to the living room.  He first shrugs his cape off onto Hux’s couch.  He spots the brown package on the caf table, wrapped together in a thin twine, and picks it up.  It’s a lot heavier than he expected.  When Kylo brings it back to Hux, he lifts it up, testing its weight.  Then, Hux nods before setting it down on the cleared countertop.  With the same dicing knife, he slices the package and unfolds the brown packaging paper.

Kylo glances over his shoulder, curious as to what the package contains.

He immediately makes eye contact with the dull eyes of a dead bird.

Kylo finds himself grimacing.

Hux looks at Kylo and immediately smirks.  “Scared of the bird, Ren?”

“Just don’t know what you’re doing with it,” Kylo mutters, now embarrassed.  “Where’d you even find a bird anyway?”

Hux looks down at the carcass and smiles briefly.  “You’d be amazed at what you find at the officers’ butcher shop when you get there early.”

Kylo raises his eyebrows.  “You must have gotten there really early,” he says.  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this before.”  He blinks, looking down at the feather-covered carcass.  “So, do we eat the feathers too, then?”

Hux rolls his eyes before reaching over to a pot containing various kitchen utensils.  He grabs a wooden spoon and shoves it in Kylo’s hand.  “Here.  Stir the stew.  Make sure nothing is sticking together.  We need it thick, but not too thick.”

Kylo easily sinks into the rhythm of stirring the thick stew.  Every once in a while, he’ll lift the spoon to look at the roots and vegetables Hux threw in there before he arrived.  Carrots.  Mushrooms.  Other ingredients he doesn’t recognize. 

“Hey, Hux?”  Kylo asks, looking over to see Hux plucking feathers off the bird.  He blinks before continuing.  “Don’t stews take a while?  We’ve only got a couple of hours before we have to go.”

Hux rips one handful of feathers off rather aggressively before throwing them into a bowl next to him.  “This doesn’t take a long time to cook.  We’ll have plenty of time.”

Next to Hux, Millicent reaches up and puts her paws on Hux’s leg, clawing at the fabric of his pants, still sadly meowing. 

“Hold on, Millie,” Hux says, still pulling off feathers.  “Let me get the bird clean.”

Kylo keeps stirring the stew.  He enjoys the silence, of hearing Hux pluck feathers while humming under his breath, of hearing Millicent purr and chitter at Hux.  It’s comfortable, after a long cycle. 

But Kylo wants to bring up what’s on both of their minds, especially after he brought up their time constraint.  It hasn’t left his thoughts since his meeting with Snoke earlier today.

But Kylo is enjoying this domesticity.  It’s rare that Hux is in this mood.  Rarer yet that Kylo gets to see it for himself.  So he keeps quiet and enjoys the company.  If Hux wants to bring it up, he will.  Kylo won’t push him.  He’ll hear about it soon enough.

Soon, Kylo hears Hux get out another cutting board from the drawer.  He hears a knife being sharpened.  Millicent starts meowing even louder. 

“Hold on, little lady,” Hux murmurs to himself.  Then, Kylo hears the wet sound of raw meat hitting the durasteel floor.  Immediately, Millicent quiets down except for little growls as she digs into her morsel of meat. 

The rest of the food preparation continues this way, with Kylo stirring the stew, lost in thought, and Hux carving the bird.  Every once in a while, Kylo will hear Hux throw a bit of meat to Millicent.  Sometimes, Hux lowers his hand so that Millicent has to balance on her hind legs to take the meat out of Hux’s hand. 

Sooner than expected, Hux nudges Kylo and takes the spoon from his hand.  He looks down at the stew, then nods.  “All right,” he says.  “I think we’re ready for the fowl.” 

Kylo watches as Hux picks up a metal bowl of neatly chopped bird and dumps it into the stew pot.  Immediately, Hux starts to stir the mixture, looking down to adjust the stovetop temperature. 

Kylo looks over at Hux’s station to see another metal bowl is still full.  “Are we not putting that in?” he asks.

Hux looks over and shakes his head.  “Those are the organs.  I think I’ll grill those later, after we get back.”  At Kylo’s queasy expression, Hux barks a laugh.  “Don’t look at me like that.  With all the places you’ve been, you’re sure to have eaten organs before.”

Kylo thinks he sees a heart peeking out from the top.  “Yeah, well, I didn’t know they were organs,” he mutters before leaning down to pick up Millicent again and sling her over his shoulder.  Now well fed, she doesn’t protest at all at being held.  She’s purring.  Her fur and whiskers tickle Kylo’s exposed neck. 

Hux shuts off the stovetop and stirs the stew one more time.  He lifts up a spoonful to sip at it before smiling to himself.

As Hux busies himself with cleaning up and stowing the unused organs in his fridge, Kylo gets bowls, spoons and cups out.  He slices some bread too, something Hux trusts him to do properly.  He fills the cups with water, knowing Hux never drinks enough of it.

Just as Kylo’s stomach starts to rumble, he has a bowl of hot stew in front of him at Hux’s small kitchen table.  A table like this really shouldn’t fit in this kitchen, considering the interior design of the room calls for meals to be eaten at Hux’s desk in his bedroom, but Hux somehow fit the rather shitty table and two chair set-up in.  Unfortunately, the setup prevents one chair from sliding out.  Whoever sits there has to climb into their seat instead. 

Fortunately for Kylo, he gets the chair that can slide out because he’s bigger than Hux, who had frowned at Kylo’s logic the first time they had a meal like this but conceded his normal spot.

On the center of the table sits a familiar setup.  Flowers, arranged in a glass vase.  They’re different from last time, blue and purple instead of red and yellow.

Kylo watches as Hux climbs into his seat.  Millicent immediately jumps into his lap and sits there expectantly.  Her yellow eyes stare unblinking at Hux’s bowl of stew.

“So,” Kylo says, breaking the silence.  “You know I’m accompanying you tonight.”

Hux picks up his bowl of stew and takes a sip from the rim.  “I know,” he says after lowering the bowl back down to the table.  “Isn’t that why you’re here, after all?”

When Hux looks back up at Kylo, finally meeting his eyes for longer than a second or two, Kylo’s thoughts spill out of his mouth.

“I found out today,” Kylo blurts out.  “After meeting with Snoke.  He said you were moving ahead.  Planning something big.  Politically, that is.”

Hux’s mouth tightens.  “I thought I kept that under wraps.”

Kylo shakes his head.  “Not from Snoke.  You know he sees everything.”

“I’m not ready for him to know yet,” Hux says, now stirring at his stew.  Millicent is quiet in Hux’s lap.  “I thought I had more time.”

“But this is a _good_ thing, Hux,” Kylo says emphatically.  “You know what he told me?  ‘The Force is calling to me,’ he said.  ‘It sits heavy on this meeting.  You must observe.’  That’s what he said.”

“I don’t trust so easily in the Force,” Hux says.

Hux has a project.  One that keeps him up late at night.  Kylo knows a little about it, for it’s the reason Hux was promoted to general in the first place two years ago.  The preliminary work is done; thankfully, Hux got research funding for that.

The project is a new kind of engine.  One powerful enough to drive a _Resurgent_ class star destroyer.  Light-weight enough to cover the cost of building.  A near infinite source of energy, though no resource is limitless.

Current First Order ships are powered using ion technology.  TIE fighters have two ion engines.  The First Order Battlecruisers, though nicknamed Star Destroyers anyway due to their similarity to the Imperial ships, are also powered this way, though with a hyperdrive component. 

But there’s a problem.  Hux refers to it as the ‘bang for your buck’.  Kylo knows it as ‘cost-benefit analysis’.  But the principle is the same.  Ion drives are costly.  They’re even more expensive when a hyperdrive component is necessary.

Something else is needed, if the First Order is to keep growing.  The organization needs ships.  And those ships need engines.  And those engines have to be cheaper than what they are now.  The First Order, after all, isn’t the Empire.  Its resources are smaller.  Its budgets, too.

So Hux came up with an idea.

A solar engine.

A solar-hyperdrive engine.

Engines not powered by inefficient solar panels but powered by the fusion of a star itself.  Hux showed Kylo the schematics long before they started dating.  It looked like a miniature hydrogen bomb, except more efficient and less likely to cause casualties.

Hydrogen is cheap.  Harvesting it from stars is a new technology, though well understood.  And Hux’s computer simulations showed success, if he were to get the next level of funding necessary to build a prototype.

But one working computer simulation _was_ enough for the commission.  Hux was promoted general, given his flagship, the _Finalizer_ , allowed to handpick his lieutenant aides and was given the chance to make his solar-hyperdrive engine a reality.

Unfortunately, Hux’s lack of experience and recent promotion stand as foes against his intelligence.  The allies he’s made are close to home.  Most aren’t even part of the First Order, which Kylo thought strange, given Hux’s strict interpretation of First Order beliefs, but Hux had clarified.

“To expand the First Order, we must know who we’re expanding into,” Hux had said, after one meeting with a pirate whose name Kylo couldn’t pronounce.  Not even Hux’s lieutenant aide, skilled in languages, could properly pronounce it.  “We just have to deal with it.  The Unknown Regions beckon, but we must know who inhabits these lands first.”

Kylo wills the Force to give Hux his funding because, truly, this is his destiny.

And, according to the meeting he had with Snoke today, the Force did answer him.

“That’s why he’s sending me with you,” Kylo says.  He leans across the small table, near falling into his bowl of stew.  “This is a turning point, Hux.  The engines could really be a reality after this meeting.  My master felt it.”

“I’m surprised Leader Snoke is so interested,” Hux says with a laugh.  He scratches at Millicent’s chest.  She lifts her head up in delight.

“He’s interested because he knows it’s going to work,” Kylo says.

“The tides have yet to change, Ren,” Hux says.  “You don’t even know what my plan is.  What my lieutenants and I have been working on for weeks.”

“And that’s why it’ll work,” Kylo says, leaning back.  “That’s why the Force is strong.  Because you’ve been busting your ass on this.”

All seriousness leaves the room at that comment.  Hux snorts.  Kylo smiles at him. 

“Your stew is getting cold,” Hux says.  He lifts his bowl to slurp some more.  He picks out a piece for Millicent and feeds it to her.

Kylo copies Hux, lifting his bowl to slurp.  Hux was right; the stew is thick, but not enough to be choking.  The vegetables are soft, but not mushy.  The meat near melts on Kylo’s tongue.  The gaminess he smelled coming into Hux’s quarters is nothing compared to what he tastes.  Oh, this is so much better.

“Did the rest of the meeting with the Supreme Leader go well?” Hux asks.

Kylo scowls at the thought of the rest of the meeting.  He slams his bowl down.  “He’s still holding me back.”

“Maybe he’s just—”

Kylo shakes his head.  “No, Hux.  There’s no evidence of any Force sensitive training that involves no combat.  My master expects me to wield a saber, but he doesn’t train me how to use it?  I mean, I have what I learned as a Jedi, but those are the basics.  Anyone can swing a saber.  What I need is the _technique_.  And he won’t give me that.”

Hux pauses, looking down into his stew.  “Does our Supreme Leader not know what’s best for all of us, Kylo?”

Kylo opens his mouth to retort but stops at the look on Hux’s face.  Closed off.

The Force prickles in the back of Kylo’s mind.

Kylo’s muscles twinge where Snoke’s electrocution hit today.

“It’s just ridiculous,” Kylo says.  “I’m ready.  I know I am.”

“I understand how you feel, Ren,” Hux says sympathetically.  “But you’ve been training with Leader Snoke for a long time.  Perhaps he sees something you don’t?”

Kylo looks to the side.  “I suppose.  At times, the Force slips from my grasp.  I can understand him being wary to let me handle a weapon at those times.”

“You could be hurt,” Hux says.

Kylo bristles at Hux’s doubt, but inside he knows he’s correct.  Kylo has a great deal left to learn.  He’ll just have to listen to his master.

Even though he’d rather collect his lightsaber from its hiding place, where Snoke ordered him to hide it months ago when he nearly killed himself with it and walk the ship with the weapon attached to his hip.  Kylo wishes he could take the saber along tonight.  He’d feel more comfortable, given that Snoke is sending him into the unknown.  Not even Hux is willing to speak about it now.

Kylo picks up his spoon and dips it into his stew.  When he sips from it, the taste explodes over his tongue.  Gaminess with hints of herb.  Lemongrass.  The waterfowl falls apart in his mouth. 

With every meal, Kylo is surprised by Hux.  At yet another detail about the man that Kylo still knows very little about. 

From Hux’s lap, between the flower centerpiece on the table, Millicent’s yellow eyes stare unblinking at him.


	2. The Mission

When Kylo first met the newly promoted General Hux upon landing his Upsilon in a _Finalizer_ hangar, six lieutenants had stood around him.  Some looked directly into Kylo’s eyes while others looked around the room, obviously avoiding him.  One even looked Kylo up and down, like they were at a bar and not in a First Order ship hangar.

That lieutenant was Cecylia Forstner, who had introduced herself to Kylo with a handshake fit for the New Republic and a “Call me Cecylia, Commander”, which was oddly refreshing given the First Order’s weirdness about saying first names aloud.

For an organization as large as the First Order, aides are a necessity for its commanding officers.  They were around in the Empire, and some became as famous as the officers they worked for.  Kylo has heard the name ‘Eli Vanto’ nearly as much as the name ‘Thrawn’.  Numerous others come to his mind, famous for desertion, for assassinations, for key political decisions or remembered by retired military commanders who speak of the people who kept them sane.  Kylo has heard the rumors, too, of the high percentage of aides who were sleeping with their superior officers, but he thinks that was blown out of proportion after secret journals were discovered in one of Thrawn’s office alluding to one Lieutenant Vanto.

Kylo remembers asking Hux if this rumor was true, and Hux had burst out laughing at the insinuation.  This was at a crossroads in their relationship when they no longer despised each other but had not addressed their growing attraction.  “Six people, Ren?” Hux had asked through wheezes.  The whiskey he had in hand threatened to spill out with his shaking.  “You think I have the magnetism for _six_?” 

Kylo _did_ think Hux had the magnetism for six but wouldn’t tell him that.  The general’s pride and ego are large enough.

Unlike the Empire, which could spare the manpower to have officers be just aides to their commanding officers, the First Order bundles the duties of an aide with the duties of a lieutenant.  As the lowest commissioned rank in the First Order navy, they have more flexibility in their schedule than a senior officer trapped by the bureaucracy.  And, of course, lieutenants are all looking upwards.  Looking for people who would help them achieve greatness.  They wanted a promotion as fast as possible; Kylo felt like he could say that about the entire fleet.  It would be a generalization only if the competitive light wasn’t bright in every set of eyes Kylo sees.  Rumors of sabotage and intimidation sweep the lower ranks, and not even Hux could stop it.

“That’s the natural order of things,” Hux had said.  “I fought like a beast as a JO, seeking my fortune.  Thankfully, engineering was less bloodthirsty than, say, piloting.  Our competitiveness exposed itself in our math, in our code.  And I excelled there.”

Upon Hux’s promotion to general, he was approached by, in Hux’s words, ‘some real shady bastards’.  They had taken him to a secure room, given him a datapad and said he had one week to select potential aides from the graduating classes of the First Order academies.  From that pool, Hux would then, in secret, visit the Academies and interview each candidate.  From there, he would finish with six aides, all graduating to be lieutenants that year.

“I wondered at the secrecy,” Hux had said when Kylo asked about the process.  “What did it matter that others in the Order knew of my personal lieutenants?  But then, I realized.”  Hux had laughed to himself.  “I was stupid, Ren, idealistic for the strangest of reasons.  Of course the members of High Command would try and turn my lieutenants against me.”  Hux had taken a long drag from his cigarette then, exhaled the sickly-sweet smoke out of the corner of his mouth.  “We may be generals and admirals now, but we can never abandon the lieutenants we once were.”

Three of those lieutenants accompany Hux and Kylo on this mission.  They meet at a nondescript shuttle adorned with no First Order symbols in one of the _Finalizer’s_ many hangars.  Kylo is grateful to see that he knows all three of the lieutenants having met them before: Lieutenant Parnew, Lieutenant Mitaka and Lieutenant Cecylia Forstner.

Cecylia waves at Kylo and gives him a wink that he almost returns.

Upon boarding, Kylo is surprised to see Hux direct Cecylia to the cockpit of the vessel, as Kylo thought he’d be the one to take her to lightspeed.  But instead, Hux points his lieutenant in the right direction of how to prime the engines, retract the landing struts and jump into lightspeed at the proper clearance distance. 

Kylo leans against the entryway of the cockpit with his arms crossed and smirks as Hux says, yet again, “Don’t slam on the reverse thrusters so hard, Cecylia, we’ve only got the four.”

Unfortunately for Kylo, he and Hux couldn’t just hide away in their quarters after the ship slips into hyperspace.  Instead, they all had to gather around a large, round durasteel table in the ship common area to listen to ‘the mission’.

Kylo is excited to finally be told about the mission.  That’s where they sit now.  Kylo watches at Lieutenant Parnew and Cecylia engage in hushed conversation in front of them.

“So,” Cecylia interrupts Kylo’s train of thought, along with everyone else’s, with the single word.  Instantly everyone is paying attention.  She’s standing up out of her seat.  Her gloved hands are clasped together.  Her blonde hair is down and her command cap sits on the table, which Kylo knows is out of regulation, but Hux hasn’t noticed or doesn’t care, and Kylo sure as hell doesn’t care, so he says nothing.

“I know we all heard about this last night,” Cecylia continues.  She blinks once at her mistake.  “Um.  I mean most of us have.”  She nervously laughs.  Parnew watches her serenely from her seat, though Kylo detects a hint of amusement too.  “But I’d thought we’d reiterate the objectives of this mission.  And explain it for the people, uh person, who hasn’t heard it yet!”

Parnew stands, effectively cutting off Cecylia before her face gets any more red.  Unlike Cecylia, her tightly braided hair is in the regulation low bun, with her command cap atop her head.  “Our mission could be described as an ‘extraction’.  But not of any physical object.  Instead, our reward will be of political and even financial support.”  She leans down to turn on a projector buried in the table, one Kylo didn’t even notice, before she and Cecylia step out of the projection. 

Kylo knows instantly who their target is.

Amora Cohn is among the last of the true Imperials, those who were forged in the failing days of the Empire.  Kylo knows much about her due to her popping up again and again in Rebellion databases.  Who funded the pro-Empire rebellion on Nou Beta?  Amora Cohn, of course.  Who hosted the Rebellion leaders on Cataath during its famous Running of the Riyas and then disappeared once their bodies were discovered, not even cold?  Amora Cohn. 

The holo projected on the screen reminds Kylo of the holos he saw in Rebellion archives.  Grey hair flowing loose around her shoulders.  Her head tilted sideways, laughing at something offscreen.  Kylo can just see gold coverings on her canine teeth.  Can just see a hint of gold claws on her fingertips of the hand clutching a glass halfway full of what has to be bourbon. 

His mother’s voice slides into Kylo’s head just then: “ _I never knew a more slippery snake, a more charismatic co’rah.  Some say she’s for the Empire.”_   A hand flung up.  “ _Never.  She’s for herself.  That’s her thing.  That’s how she always wins.”_

Next to Kylo, Mitaka’s nervous expression gives way to a small scowl.

“Our spies couldn’t get us a holo until recently,” Cecylia says.  “But I think this supports everything we heard from them earlier.”

Hux purses his lips at the sight.  “How recent?”

“Two weeks, sir,” says Parnew.

He nods.  “Good.  Good.  That means the plan is still in motion.”  Then, Hux stands and walks over to stand next to Parnew.  Kylo notices that he towers over the lieutenant. 

“To refresh those who have heard and to tell those who have not,” says Hux.  “Our plan is a risky one.  We’re relying on, at most, two-week old intel.  But most of our sources come from months of eavesdropping.  I can’t promise we’ll succeed, but I hope we do.

“I’m sure everyone here has heard of Amora Cohn and is aware of her influence in the First Order.  She comes from old blood.  Imperial blood.  That makes her powerful.  More powerful than any of us at this table.”  Hux shakes his head.  “But that’s not why we’re going to her.”

Hux points at the necklace Cohn is wearing.  The necklace curves around her neck and ends in two sharp points, what look like teeth, before being connected by a prong-like structure, like a branch or a turning river.  It’s wrought in gold and sits brightly on her tan skin. 

“This is why we’re turning to Cohn,” Hux says.  He jabs a finger at the necklace again.  “This necklace right here.”

“It’s a necklace,” Kylo finds himself saying.  “Artful, yes, but what connections can we draw from it?  That she’s so rich any bribery would bring nothing?  That’s all I see.”

“Look closer,” Mitaka interjects, though quietly.

“He’s right,” Hux says.  With one finger, he traces the curve of the necklace, before tapping on the tooth on one end.  “Does anyone know what this symbol is?”

“It’s Arkani,” Cecylia answers promptly.  “That’s our in.”

“I don’t understand,” Kylo says.

Hux looks vastly uncomfortable before pushing on.  “My mother is from Arkanis, Ren.”

“I know _that_ ,” Kylo says.  “How does that matter?”

“Because she is _from_ _Arkanis_.”  Hux inhales, as if bracing himself.  “As in there before the Imperials, Ren.  For generations before Stormtroopers ever set foot there.”

Kylo blinks.  “Oh.”

Kylo has known Hux for two years, has dated him for three months, and yet he doesn’t know this.

“I see,” Kylo continues.  Hux hasn’t blinked.  “I suppose then that Cohn has a…fascination with Arkanis.  She’d want to know more.”

Hux visibly exhales.  “Yes.  Our in is me.  We…hope that she’ll know enough and recognize me to be Arkani.  Not just from Arkanis.  But of the planet.”  He nods.  “Her fascination will bring her to me, and I will bring her my plan.  I’ll tell her all about the solar-hyperdrive engines.  Then, hopefully, she’ll endorse me.”

“And not just Arkanis,” Mitaka says, surprising Kylo and…no one else.  Again, he’s frustrated that Snoke or Hux didn’t tell him anything.  Kylo looks back at the necklace but sees nothing but the teeth and the river bridging the two.  “It goes beyond fascination with Arkanis.”

Mitaka goes to join everyone standing, leaving Kylo sitting alone.

“I wondered why we brought you along at first,” Cecylia says.  “Considering this mission and all.  I’m still surprised you’re here.”

Mitaka only makes brief eye contact with Hux before shrugging.  “It was necessary,” is all he says.  He points a gloved finger at the screen, at the river branching the two teeth together.  “We all think that this is a river, yes?”

Kylo wonders why he’s using ‘we’ when it’s obvious everyone but him knows what’s going on.  He huffs under his breath.  “I assume so.”

“So did I, when I first saw it,” Mitaka says.  He draws a finger across the wall.  The projection is over him now, reflected off his body.  “Water imagery is common in Arkani artifacts.  A river branching two teeth would make sense, here.”  He shakes his head.  “But it’s not a river.”  He pauses, looking down.  “It’s an antler.”

The room goes silent, as if that was some jaw-dropping information.

“Cool,” Kylo says.  “Why does that matter?”

Mitaka opens his mouth to respond, but Hux cuts him off.  “It represents the bridge between Arkanis and Aetheria, Ren,” Hux says quickly.  “The connection between two planets, between a common people split apart by war and culture.”  He points to himself.  “Arkanis.”  He points to Mitaka.  “Aetheria.  Two planets.  Two people.”  Hux then points to Cohn.  “Two people she most definitely _will_ want to talk to, even for such steep a price as political and financial support for a theoretical engine.  Now, Cecylia—”

“Hold on,” Kylo says.  “You’ve lost me.”

“Lost you where?”

Kylo blinks.  “Maybe at the _beginning_?  Hux.  All I’ve heard you say about Arkanis is that it’s a watery hell of a rock at the edge of the Unknown Regions.”

Mitaka’s mouth drops.  He looks at Hux in disbelief.

But Hux is shaking his head.  “You know I don’t believe that,” he mutters.

Kylo ignores him.  He stands, not wanting to be the person sitting in ignorance anymore.  “And now you’re telling me that there’s some…hidden history to Arkanis?”

“Yes, Ren,” Hux says sharply.  His eyes flash.  “There is.”

“Mind _telling_ me about it all?” Kylo prompts.

Hux doesn’t breathe.  “Arkanis is a planet located on the edge of the Unknown Regions.  For millennia, it was home to native people that raised waterlily and waterfowl on the banks of the planet’s lakes and rivers and oceans.  Then, during the time of the Empire, the Imperials took control of the planet for use as a fueling station for missions into the Unknowns Regions.  An Academy was set up.  I was born.  I left.  Now, we’re all here together, standing around a table.”

“And the symbols.  The teeth and the river and the antler?”

“The symbols are our way in to Cohn’s good graces, Ren,” Hux says curtly.  “Nothing more.  Nothing less.  She has a fascination and I will indulge her.”

“Like you indulged me?”

Hux’s upper lip twitches, near revealing a sharp canine.  Kylo stares back, unblinking. 

The room has become uncomfortably tense.  Next to Hux, Mitaka has taken a couple steps back and is poised on the balls of his feet.  Cecylia’s eyes are wide. 

Parnew clears her throat.  “Back to the mission parameters.  It’ll take us time to reach Cohn, even with General Hux’s name and status.  We’ll have to work our way up.”

“Exactly,” Cecylia says loudly.  “So.  Parnew and I will chat up the room, dropping hints of Hux’s lineage.  Should be easy enough to work it into the conversation.  Cohn’s supporters like to dress like her, so the Arkani symbols should be everywhere.”

“Once one of us works our way to a meeting with Cohn, we’ll contact the general through his comm.”  Parnew glances briefly at Mitaka.  “The same protocol will apply with you.”

Mitaka smiles briefly.  “Of course.”

Parnew looks to Hux.  “I assume the both of you will have the required…items, for meeting with Cohn.”

“I’ll wear mine,” Hux says flatly.

“I can’t, but I’m sure there’s someplace I can hide them,” says Mitaka.

“Please don’t go on the roof or something,” Hux mutters.  “We can’t have any security incidents this time.”

“That was an accident—”

“Moving on!” Cecylia says, clapping her hands once.  “Mitaka, your job is to stand in the corner and say nothing.  We all know, except Commander Ren but he will learn soon, that you are terrible at playing politics and are a horrible liar with this stuff.  No speaking.”

Mitaka opens his mouth to defend himself but closes it just as quickly.

“General Hux, do you know your responsibilities?” Parnew asks.

Hux nods.  “Build alliances with the other guests.  Other powerful people are sure to be there, and I need as many contacts as I can.”  He looks to Parnew.  “I might also be…talking with non-Basic speakers, so I need you to listen to your comm in case I need you.”

“I’ll be ready to disengage once you give the signal, sir,” Parnew says.

Kylo can’t help but think this sounds a lot like a tactical meeting before a battle.

“There we are, then,” Hux says.  He goes to the table to shut the projector off.  The lights come on immediately after he does so.  “The plan.  Any questions?”

Kylo has one immediately.  “Yeah, what should I do?”

The room falls silent once more.  Hux won’t look at Kylo.  The lieutenants stare at each other, equally confused.  Obviously they didn’t know Kylo would join them until recently; the Force hadn’t let Snoke know of this meeting’s importance until today. 

Just as Kylo is about to propose his own suggestion, Parnew breaks the silence.

“Where do your gifts then lie, oh warrior?”  Parnew asks.  “On the streets of Syain or the fields of a thousand men?”

Kylo tilts his head at her.  Her eyes glitter knowingly.  He finds himself quoting from a book he hasn’t read in years, one that had real pages, one he read in a library on an old Rebellion base.  “Are they not both battlefields, where my weapon is unsheathed and drawing blood?”

Parnew’s mouth quirks in a small smile.  She turns to Cecylia.  “What do you think?”

Cecylia nods.  “We think you should follow Hux.  You’d do good there.”

Kylo almost says he doesn’t want to.  He doesn’t.  But barely.

“I have another question,” Kylo asks loudly.  It gets a glare from Hux, but he doesn’t care.  “Where _exactly_ are we going?”

Cecylia and Parnew blink at each other.  Like they didn’t consider the fact that that might be important for Kylo to know. 

“A casino town,” Mitaka ends up answering.  “One that attracts the rich and the self-important.  Those that have the money to gamble at the whipping and whimpering of fathiers.”

“It’s called Canto Bight,” Cecylia interrupts.  “Heard of it?”

Kylo has heard of it.

Thankfully, no one has to explain Canto Bight to him.

He knows exactly what Canto Bight is.

* * *

Hux hurried out of the room and vanished in the ship before Kylo could catch up to him and pull him aside to ask what the _hell_ that was all about.

Arkanis?  Teeth?  Rivers and antlers of gold?  Waterfowl and waterlily?

Suddenly, Kylo thinks that Hux’s meal may have meant more than he let in on.  “A particularly good find in the officers’ shop,” Hux had said.

Kylo scowls where he leans against a wall by the entryway into the meeting room.  What a load of bantha shit.

Hux and Kylo haven’t been dating long, haven’t been even civil that long, but…Kylo has told Hux things.  About his past.  Things he wishes he had done.  Hadn’t done.  Things he did.  Things he wants to do.  All told while Hux would stroke his hair or lean against his shoulder or just _be_ there.

Why wouldn’t Hux let Kylo be there for _him_? 

Kylo scowls at the floor.  The Force swirls in his mind, agitated.  Instead of letting the Force loose, shaking the ship or shattering the lights, Kylo storms off to the cockpit of the ship.  He sits there and watches the stars streak by in lightspeed.  His breathing slows.  Becomes deeper.  Kylo closes his eyes, rests his head against the seat.

In his mind, the Force swirls like a rainstorm.  Thunders, leaving a headache behind Kylo’s eyes.

Kylo groans and scrunches his eyes shut.  “What do you want from me?” he asks.  “Why did Snoke tell me this meeting was important?  What did you _tell_ him?”

The Force, as always, says nothing.  It continues to pulse in Kylo’s mind. 

Anger gone, Kylo is only left with the pent-up energy from his rage.  He looks at the cockpit controls, tries to focus on how these controls differ from his Upsilon or his TIE.

But no.  The Force compels him elsewhere. 

But where?

Kylo doesn’t know.

He pushes himself out of the seat and leaves the cockpit.  While wandering the ship, Kylo sinks deep in his thoughts once more.  Now calm, he’s able to look at Hux more clearly.

Hux wouldn’t tell him about Arkanis.  Kylo had asked in the past, after Hux mentioned his time there as a boy with his father, but Hux had waved a hand at him and said he barely remembered it.  How could a boy of five remember a planet of constant rain?

Apparently a boy of five _could_ remember.  And apparently a man of thirty-one could recall the symbols of his home planet and know that they could only help him.

Why wouldn’t Hux just tell Kylo?  Kylo was born on a planet too.

The teeth.  The river.  The antler.  Gold teeth and gold hands.

And Aetheria.  Hux mentioned it was another planet, one Lieutenant Mitaka is somehow connected to. 

The antler.  Joining together two teeth.

Plated in gold.  On the neck of an Imperial who’s as Coruscanti as they come.

Kylo turns the corner to approach the one hangar on the vessel.  Usually holding cargo or a small private ship, the hangar is empty of all things except for dull voices.  Then, the _clack_ of a collision, then a sharp s _hring_ of metal sliding against metal.

He rounds the corner to see a strange sight.

Kylo knows that every First Order officer went through combat training.  Even the officers who would likely never see combat.  They would learn their standard Imperial Combat Exercises, meant to promote unity among their company, and Echani, a martial art form characterized by getting your opponent down on the ground with a blaster at the back of their neck as fast as you fucking could.

What Kylo sees in front of him can’t be the standard Imperial Combat Exercises or even the unarmed Echani.

Instead, it’s Lieutenant Mitaka, curved daggers in each hand, blocking the advances of Lieutenant Parnew, who is expressing the strongest emotion Kylo has seen yet from her.  They’re both in standard First Order workout gear, though Parnew still wears gloves.  Her brows are furrowed, her eyes tracking every moment of her opponent as she advances towards him.  She holds a spear in one hand, held out from her in proper form, Kylo notices, before she takes a swing at Mitaka. 

Kylo hopes that the metal point was dulled before this sparring session, but it wouldn’t have mattered anyway.  As the point of the spear swings towards Mitaka’s head, he leans back and catches the pointed tip on the edge of the dagger.  With the other, he slams the blade underneath the metal shaft before pushing upwards and pulling back, wrenching the spear out of Parnew’s hands and flinging it to the side.  The weapon clatters against the durasteel floor. 

Mitaka then holds one dagger out to Parnew.  They’re both breathing hard as Parnew lifts her hands up in surrender.  Kylo sees her eyes flash dangerously, some inner anger trying to peak out, before Mitaka speaks.  They both still haven’t noticed Kylo standing in the doorway, watching.

“That was better,” Mitaka says, dropping the dagger to point at the floor.  “Where did you make your mistake?”

“I overextended,” Parnew says, still breathing hard.  She walks over to pick up the spear.  “I lost my sense of balance.  I couldn’t keep my hold on the ground and my weapon.  My body chose to stay standing.  My hands let go.”

“Exactly,” Mitaka says.  Kylo notices his right hand flips and spins one of the daggers without his notice.  “Think of the spear as an extended arm.  Your center of gravity must compensate for the distance.”  Mitaka pushes himself onto his right foot, then onto the ball.  He wobbles briefly before setting himself back down.  “Your reach will be greater, putting you at an advantage over someone with daggers.”  He tosses one in the air, then catches it again.  “But your balance must always be in your control.” 

Parnew is nodding.  Then, she freezes, looking right at Kylo.  Her expression closes off immediately.

“What?  What is it?”  Mitaka asks while turning around.  His expression also closes off, and his eyes widen.  Kylo is reminded of a rabbit, frozen at the sight of a predator.

“Um,” Kylo says intelligently.  “Don’t mind me,” he says, entering the room.  “I’m just…going to meditate.”  He points at the hangar exit, where the stars streak by.  “Hyperspace stars are a good focal point.  I’ll stay out of your way.”

Kylo turns his face away and winces briefly.

“Of course, Commander,” Parnew says serenely.  Kylo is more nervous by her lack of emotion than the anger that was present before.  “We’ll be sure to steer clear as well.”

Kylo nods once before awkwardly flapping a hand at them.  He hurries into the room and sits down cross-legged in the corner.  Now, Kylo can see both the stars streaking outside and the two lieutenants sparring. 

The _clink_ and _clatter_ of daggers and spears starts up again, though it sounds more reserved this time.  Kylo notices he can barely hear what they’re saying anymore, which is surprising, considering this ship hangar is relatively tiny. 

While still keeping an eye on the sparring pair, Kylo sinks into his breathing exercises.  He focuses on his inner Force, still turbulent, but calmer than in the cockpit.

The sparring in front of Kylo actually does some good, as it provides plenty of white noise so that he can focus.  Even if the voices are getting louder, enough so that Kylo can pick up on some of the playful conversation.

From her frustrated exclamations, Kylo infers that Parnew has yet to win.

It gets so loud, so distracting, that Kylo doesn’t make it through half the exercise before he’s given up to completely watch the show.  Maybe he can even learn something from it; as Hux loves to point out, Kylo never went through the Academy.  Surely, the techniques he sees are from those lessons, even if Kylo doesn’t recognize them as such.

Kylo watches Lieutenant Mitaka knock the spear out of Lieutenant Parnew’s hands.  Her only reaction is to gracefully stomp towards the spear, pick it up and charge Mitaka yet again.

A shimmer in the Force lets Kylo know that someone else is in the room with them.  He looks up to see Cecylia walking over towards him. 

“They at it again?” she asks.

“Apparently so,” Kylo says.  He stands up.  “I have to admit…I wasn’t expecting this.”

Cecylia shakes her head.  “Yeah, well, you haven’t been around us long enough.  The instant Parsnip heard Mit knew about all this stuff…she was all over that.”  She crosses her arms.  “Always wanted to learn.  Parents never let her.  Not even the basics.”

Kylo blinks.  “I thought combat training was standard.”

Cecylia snorts.  “Yeah.  It is.  But this isn’t.”  Then, she lifts two fingers to her lips and whistles sharply.  Kylo winces at the sound.  “Parnew!  Got a minute for a question?”

Parnew holds up a single finger before passing her spear to Mitaka, who’s already sheathed his daggers at his hips.  He watches her as she trots towards them.

“What is it?” Parnew asks once she stops in front of them.  Her tightly braided hair is pulled back in a half-up, half-down style, one Kylo favors when working out as well.  She’s breathing hard, but not panting. 

“Do you remember the cultural practices of the Otaha?” Cecylia asks.  “I’m blanking, and Hux is blanking majorly.  There’s going to be a second tier source who’s from there.  I think we’d both prefer if Hux didn’t step on any of his twenty toes.”

“Yeah, I remember reading something about them,” Parnew says.  “I’d recommend going in with some kind of swagger.  People from Otaha rely on body language more than anything spoken.  And the dominant party will always lead the conversation.  Is he going to be our in?”

“Maybe.  It’s an option.”

“I’d keep it as a last resort,” Parnew says.  “Otahains rely on physical intimidation, and they’re a rather large species.  The general is…”

“Tall and skinny, yeah,” Cecylia finishes.  “I know it’s a long shot.  Thanks anyway.” 

Parnew smiles briefly.  “Of course.  I’ll be with you in an hour if that’s all right.”

“Yeah, that’s fine,” Cecylia says.  Then, as Parnew turns to leave, “Hold on a second, Snip, I’ve got another question.”

Parnew turns back and furrows her brows.  “Yes?”

“Do you want to beat him?”

Parnew blinks.  “What?”

“Do you want to _beat_ him?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Snip, I’ve seen you knocked on your arse and your weapon slammed out of your hands for too damn long,” Cecylia says.  “How many weeks have you been sparring with him?  How many times have you won?”

Parnew’s eyes narrow.  “I just need more practice.”

“I think you need a push,” Cecylia says.  “Look back at him, but don’t let him see you.”  As Parnew does this, Cecylia continues.  “What do you see?”

Kylo looks back with Parnew to see Mitaka pacing the hangar.  Sometimes he walks back and forth, sometimes in a circle.  He’ll look out the hangar, out towards the stars stretched into thin lines by light speed.  He swings the spear inconsequentially, nearly spins it around his head at a time.

“He’s walking around,” Parnew says.  “Keeping his muscles warm.” 

“Look harder.”

So Kylo looks too. 

He sees it just as Parnew does.

“He favors his left,” she says.

“Which means?” Cecylia prompts.

“There’s a weakness in the right,” Parnew says.  “A natural imbalance to his center of gravity.”

Parnew is right.  For every step Mitaka takes on his right leg is stiff and immediately followed by the barest visible limp on his left.  Barely noticeable unless you were looking.  Probably nonexistent normally but brought to the surface after this long sparring session.

“I’ll tell you the rest, save some time,” Cecylia says.  “He’s got an old injury.”  She taps her upper thigh, right on top of the muscle.  “Right here.  You get it now?”

Parnew nods.  Then, like nothing is the matter, like she doesn’t have his new information, Parnew walks back over to Mitaka.  She calls something out to him, something that makes him smirk as he throws her back her spear.  He unsheathes his daggers and flips them to change their grip.

Kylo feels a tension in the air, like before a dog race.  Something in the Force…letting him know something is about to be released.

A grin splits Cecylia’s face.  “Come on, Snip, take him down.”

“I’m surprised she didn’t see it before,” Kylo says.

Cecylia snorts.  “She did.  She’s going easy on him.  Even after she demanded he not go easy on her.” 

After a sharp and short whistle from Mitaka, the sparring begins.

Immediately Kylo notices a difference.

Unlike before, Parnew doesn’t test the waters with shallow jabs or circular pacing at and around her opponent.  Instead, she rushes forward and swings her spear in an arc, making Mitaka duck to avoid the pointed tip.

Kylo sees Mitaka’s eyes widen before they light up in something like delight.

He and Cecylia are close enough that they can see these details: determination in Parnew, delight in Mitaka.

The battle continues and is no less aggressive.

Kylo can distinctly tell the difference between the Mitaka who was teaching and the Mitaka who is truly sparring now.  The slashes he makes with his curved daggers are swifter and more forceful.  It takes all of Parnew’s focus to dodge or deflect them with her spear.  Every so often, Mitaka will spin a dagger in his hand, flip it from overhand to underhand.  Kylo tries to follow the motion, but it’s too quick.  The knife curves forward, then a second later curves backward.  The ceiling lights reflect off the metal, making Kylo squint with every knife spin.

Parnew is tiring.  She’s backing up more than moving forward.  She’s spending all her energy and focus on just keeping those curved daggers away from her.  Mitaka notices this and presses forward, getting her closer and closer to the hangar exit, where only a forcefield separates them from the lightspeed bubble.

Kylo sees Mitaka’s lips twitch upward.

Then, he sees Mitaka make a critical mistake.

An opening.  Just as he’s lifting his right arm to slash downward. 

Parnew sees the opening.  Kylo sees Mitaka’s eyes widen before Parnew lifts her leg and kicks Mitaka in the upper thigh as hard as she can. 

Mitaka whines like a shot animal.  Immediately, his right leg tries to buckle.  He reaches down with one hand to grab at his shaking leg.  He’s not prepared for Parnew to hit him again, this time with a knee against his right hand wrist.  Mitaka instinctively lets go of that dagger.  It clatters against the floor.

He looks up at Parnew’s face.  Kylo sees his nostrils flare as he limps backwards, holding onto his right leg as he does so.

Parnew advances on him.  There’s no limp in her legs.  She raises her spear and swings it.  Mitaka barely has time to lift his remaining dagger to deflect it.

But without his center, there’s no strength to the block.  The other dagger is knocked out of Mitaka’s hand, so that he only has his fists.  He throws one at Parnew’s face, but her agility is better than his.  She dodges it.

In desperation, Mitaka rushes Parnew and grabs onto her spear with both hands and wraps his injured leg around hers.  They grapple with it, snarling into each other’s faces, near spitting at each other in their desperation to win.  Any friendly sparring has been forgotten.  They’ve both sunken into the fight.

Then, just as Mitaka is about to pull Parnew to the ground, she leans back and drives the shaft of her spear forward as hard as she can.  It smacks into Mitaka’s face with a dull _thwack_ that echoes through the hangar.  Disoriented, he falls to the ground, barely catching himself with one hand. 

When Mitaka looks back up, it’s to see Parnew standing in front of him, breathing hard, her spear tip pointed directly at him. 

Kylo can see blood on his face, where the spear struck him. 

“Fucking hell,” Cecylia says in a whisper.

Parnew stands there with her spear held aloft.

Mitaka blinks once.  “Cassini?” he says softly.

Parnew’s spear starts to shake.  She drops it. 

Mitaka tries to stand, but stumbles.  Parnew immediately rushes forward to catch him, and with that contact, the tension in the air is broken by excited and worried yelling.

Cecylia whistles.  “She actually did it.”  She sounds impressed.  “Wow.  Well.  I better get them a med kit.  I really should have told her not to kick his leg so hard.  He _does_ need to be walking tomorrow.”

Kylo doesn’t respond.  In fact, he’s near tuned out of the conversation. 

Any thoughts of Arkanis and Aetheria are far from his mind.

Instead, Kylo wonders how the sparring he just witnessed came to be.


	3. Revelations

Kylo is still lost in thought when he inputs his code to get into Hux’s quarters.  His mind is fixated on the spinning of the spear in Cassini Parnew’s hands.  The quick wrist movements from Mitaka that flip the curved knife from one grip to another.

How quickly both lieutenants sank into snarls and biting in their desperation to win.

These thoughts swirl in Kylo’s mind as he enters Hux’s quarters.  By his estimate, it has to be late.  Hux must be asleep by now.  Kylo will have to be careful when he slides into bed.

But Hux isn’t asleep.

Hux sits on the chair in the small adjoining room to the captain’s bedroom.  There’s only two plush chairs and a small table, so it can barely be called a living space.  But Hux has already begun to live in it: datapads are strewn across the table.  Two glasses of whiskey sit on the table: one full, one empty except for ice. 

Hux is in his robe.  There’s a scowl on his face as he looks at Kylo.

Kylo freezes at the door and stares back at the general.

Hux narrows his eyes.

“You won’t believe what I just saw, Hux,” Kylo begins.  The Force no longer clouds his mind or sits heavy there. All he sees is the two lieutenants sparring.  A spear spin.  A flip of a curved dagger.

“Really,” Hux says dangerously.  “I almost didn’t believe what I saw today.  What I heard.  In the meeting.  Ren.”

Kylo blinks.  He removes himself from the memory of the sparring and thinks back to their meeting. 

A familiar irritation settles in his stomach. 

At Kylo’s scowl, Hux smirks.  “There he is.  Remembering now that I’ve brought it up.”

Kylo smirks back.  “I guess that makes one thing you’ll bring up to me.”

Hux’s smirk falls into a sneer.  He pushes himself up off the chair to stomp towards Kylo.  Kylo holds his ground and lets Hux get up in his face.  They’re both breathing hard.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” Hux hisses.

Kylo raises an eyebrow.  “Don’t I?” he says innocently.  “Should I have checked my stew for teeth, Hux?  Would have completed the Arkani set, right?”

Hux doesn’t react the way Kylo expected.  Instead of getting in his face, shouting until he’s red in the face, Hux steps back.  His eyes are wide as he stares up at Kylo.  Like what Kylo just said was a betrayal.

Any anger Kylo had vanishes.  He lifts a hand to brush Hux’s face.  “Hux?”

But Hux tilts his head away.  “Don’t,” he says.  He inhales shakily.  “Do not touch me.”

“Hux, what—”

But Hux shakes his head again.  When he looks up at Kylo, his face is flushed red.  He points a finger at Kylo’s chest.  It feels like Hux is instead pointing a blaster.  “Don’t—don’t,” he says before turning away, his robe whirling like his greatcoat does.  Hux walks through the doorway into his quarters and slides the door shut. 

Kylo hears the lock click right afterward.

He’s left alone, standing in Hux’s living room. 

Kylo suddenly feels very tired.

Hux has always been a mystery to Kylo.  A mystery since the first time Kylo saw him, back when he was still a colonel.  Hux hadn’t given anything away then.  Kylo had wrongfully assumed him to be static and uninteresting.  Hux was what the Empire always wanted to be.  Cold.  Ruthless.  Calculating.  Resistant to manipulation.  Aware of corruption and moral enough to hate it. 

Things had changed, somewhat, when Kylo and Hux first slammed into each other like dogs in an alley.  Biting and snarling at each other, Kylo realized that something feral simmered under Hux’s officer persona.  He was hooked.  He was fascinated.

Kylo still is.  He stares at the locked bedroom door and thinks back to what he said, not without some guilt, an emotion he hasn’t felt for some time.

Hux has never reacted so strongly before to anything Kylo has said before.  And Kylo has said a _lot_.  Called him a bastard.  Called him weak, scrawny, unfit to lead the First Order.  Called him a boot-licking sycophant, him and all his officers. 

But to react at a jab at a symbol he had scoffed at before? 

Strange. 

To understand why Hux flushed so angrily, Kylo must understand what the symbols mean.  That way, in the morning, perhaps Kylo can make it up to Hux.  Bring him a gift between his teeth like a cat bringing home a hunted bird.  Like Millicent bringing in a dead mouse.

Kylo picks up one of the datapads on the caf table and sits in the plush chair.  He swipes it open, noticing Hux is still logged in.

Good.  Kylo has yet to set up his own profile, instead preferring to hack onto other people’s accounts.  That way, nothing could be traced back to him.

Kylo looks up ‘ _Arkanis_ ’ in the First Order database.  As expected, the first results pertain to the arrival of the Imperials, the establishment of the Academy and the forced exodus once the Empire was certain to fall. 

So Kylo narrows his search.  He ends up with a small snippet of an article, crammed at the end of a piece on Arkani wildlife.

_Now let us move on to the people of Arkanis, for their knowledge of the wildlife of this planet is far greater than this author’s.  The Arkani revere what the Empire has named the Great Arkani Cats, though the natives refer to this beast differently._

The next paragraph discusses the Imperial effort to curtail the Great Arkani Cat population, since they were killing off the nerf herds.  Kylo moves on down the page to the next paragraph.

_Many times I have seen claws and teeth sewn into Arkani clothing or shaped in jewelry, along with the many flowering plants of Arkanis, though the flowers themselves hold more complex symbology than the claws or teeth.  Other animals of note include fish and waterfowl, an important staple to the traditional Arkani diet, due to being such a water-dominant planet._

Kylo reads on to the next paragraph, only to see that he’s reached the end.  Was that it?  Sure, the article gave him some new information, something about flower symbolism, but nothing that could explain Hux’s behavior.  Kylo understands that the teeth are important symbols, but why hide their true meaning?  Why would Hux keep Kylo ignorant about something like this?  It’s not even that personal; Hux has told Kylo about deeper things than what a tooth means.  Than what some flower means.

Again, Kylo curses how the First Order has separated itself from the collective Galactic Network.  There’s not even a connection for Kylo to exploit on this datapad. 

He’ll learn nothing more here.  Kylo will have to ask Hux, to elaborate more.  But that will come later, when Hux unlocks the door.  Hopefully.

The longer Kylo dwells on this, the worse he feels about it all.  How flushed with anger Hux got…how _upset_ he was. 

Kylo shakes his head.  He can’t focus on that right now.  It’ll only make things worse.

For now, Kylo turns his attention back toward what he saw in the empty hangar earlier.

Kylo has seen many weapons in the First Order, but none were so…personal as a dagger and spear.  The closest equivalent Kylo can come up with is the stormtrooper riot baton, but even that weapon exudes an aura of detachment from the battle at hand.  And the countless blasters and cannons separate their wielders and controllers even more from the battle at hand.

Strange that this form of combat would even exist in just two officers.

Kylo thinks back to the meeting, back to the planet Hux spoke of in referring to Arkanis.

Aetheria.

Somehow, it and Lieutenant Mitaka are connected.

In all of his travels and general knowledge, Kylo has never heard of such a place.  He picks up Hux’s half-empty glass of whiskey and takes a sip.  Then, savoring the strong taste, Kylo turns back to the datapad on his lap and types in the aforementioned word.

Then, something strange happens.  No results appear.

“That’s odd,” Kylo says.  But no matter how often he searches the word, in different spellings and contexts, Aetheria will not appear.

Suddenly, Kylo has an idea.  Of how to answer all his questions.  On maybe not Aetheria, but on Arkanis…perhaps this could work…

Maybe…

Kylo opens a new tab on the datapad and inputs a new name.

HUX, ARMITAGE

But just before he presses enter, Kylo pauses.  He looks at the locked door beside him, where Hux is likely still awake, lying there angry and upset at what Kylo said.

No.  Kylo can’t do this.  He won’t invade Hux’s privacy like that.

Kylo looks down at the datapad and closes the tab with a sigh.  He then sets the pad on the table and picks up Hux’s glass of whiskey.  Kylo takes a sip and contemplates the day’s events.

Arkanis.  Aetheria.  Teeth.  Rivers.  Antlers.  Gold.  A woman Hux must convince to aide him so his project may be more than just theoretical one day.  The Force, swirling in Kylo’s mind, telling him _something_ , though Kylo can’t figure out what it wants.

Snoke said the Force will sit heavy on this meeting.  Kylo thinks it’s already sat down and made itself at home on this ship.  But for what reason?

He doesn’t know.

Kylo feels his eyelids drooping.  He sets the whiskey back on the table before it spills.  Then he slides off his boots, leaving himself still in his tunic, pants and socks. 

Two curved daggers spinning and flipping in Lieutenant Mitaka’s hands.  Lieutenant Parnew spinning her spear.  Parnew kicking an old wound of Mitaka’s…caused by what?  Irrelevant.  But enough to make him weaken, enough so that Parnew could slam her spear shaft into his face and knock him to the ground.

Soon, Kylo finds himself sliding in and out of sleep.  He feels his Force abilities slip in and out of his control.  During one of those times, as Kylo finally falls into a real sleep, he hears someone calling through the Force.

_Great Mother, guide your children…_

Then, a second voice, brushing over the first.  _The strongest of the seven sisters…_

_I am your sword and spear…_

_Carry me to success…_

_Matria, puer fava mira mei…_

These voices soothe Kylo, slumped in the plush living room chair, to sleep.


	4. Canto Bight

Kylo wakes to a stiff back on the plush chair in Hux’s living room.  The ship’s hyperdrive engines hum at a near undetectable volume.  So they’re not there yet.  But soon.

With a groan, Kylo stretches and cracks his shoulders.  He blinks the sleep out of his eyes and looks at the table in front of him.  Datapads lay scattered across the surface.  The glass of whiskey is completely without ice, having melted overnight. 

Kylo eyes the door to the bedroom before sighing deeply, rubbing his hands down his face.  He gets up and walks towards the door.

Surprisingly, the door slides open with a hiss, revealing an empty bed with the sheets thrown back.  Uncharacteristic of Hux, but Hux has been uncharacteristic lately.

When Kylo walks into the bedroom, he sees Hux standing in full dress uniform, minus the command cap, in front of a full length mirror by the bed in the corner of the room.  He doesn’t look up when Kylo walks in, doesn’t tell him to get out, so Kylo goes to stand next to him.

Hux’s head is bowed.  His eyes are on something in his hands. 

Kylo peers around Hux’s shoulder to see what it is.  It must be his command cap, to complete the uniform properly.

But Kylo is surprised to see that Hux is holding what must be a copper circlet.  The metal looks delicate, like it could be crushed with human hands.  That must be the reason Hux holds it so carefully in his gloved ones. 

Carefully sculpted copper flowers, some with small gems in the middle of the petals, adorn the delicate structure of the circlet. 

“You’re up early,” Kylo says.

Hux shrugs.  “I couldn’t sleep.”

“How long until we get there?”

“About two hours.”

Hux tilts the circlet, so it catches the artificial light of the bedroom lights.

Kylo clears his throat.  “That’s very beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“Are those sunstones in the center there?”

Hux shakes his head.  “No.  They’re amber actually.”

Kylo nods.  He doesn’t understand the significance of gemstones in Arkani culture, but after his reading the night before, he thinks they must be important, if they adorn a circlet Hux holds so carefully.

Now a bit more nervous, Kylo asks his next question.

“What do the flowers mean?”

Hux’s grip tightens on the circlet.  Kylo hopes it’s stronger than it looks.

“You did some research last night.”

Kylo nods.  “Yeah.  I did.  Hux, what I said—”

Hux finally looks at Kylo then.  Kylo near steps back at the brightness in his eyes, contrasting with the dark circles under them.  “Ren,” Hux says.  His focus slides off Kylo, zoning out into his own thoughts, those Kylo would not let himself read.

Hux’s face slides back into its normal neutral expression.  “Ren.  I would prefer if we…discussed last night after the meeting.  I-I can’t let myself get distracted.”  Hux’s face gets tighter.  He looks down.  “It’s taking me enough as is.”

Kylo’s frustration still bubbles under the surface, but Hux is right.  It’s not the right time to talk about this.  They have a job to do.  “That’s fine.”

Hux looks back up to smile crookedly before he turns back to the mirror.  He’s breathing hard.  His nose scrunches a little bit before he closes his eyes.  Then, Hux lifts the circlet above his head and sets it down. 

Kylo can’t help but think of it as some coronation.  Hux, in his First Order dress uniform, crowning himself with Arkanis.  He wonders what Hux thinks about this, about desecrating the uniform like this.  Hux has always been a stickler for protocol. 

“You look radiant,” Kylo says softly, staring at Hux in the mirror.

And he does.  Even exhausted, before he applies his undereye concealer, Hux is luminous.  Kylo is pleased to see that Hux’s hair is styled the way he likes, with some volume fighting against the regulatory pomade.  The white uniform top, though in the same style as Hux’s normal black, contrasts in a lovely way with Hux’s belt and uniform pants.  His boots shine.

And on Hux’s head: a crown of copper.  Adorned in flowers.

If they weren’t in such a tense situation, Kylo would take Hux in his arms and kiss him.

Instead, Kylo lets Hux escape to his datapads and makes himself get ready to put on his own dress uniform.  He stands in the sonic and thinks of how he’ll braid his hair for his own command cap, as Kylo has no circlet to crown himself with.

Kylo holds the cap in his gloved hand as he steps out the bedroom into the living area.  Hux looks up from the datapad on his lap.  The circlet catches the light and glimmers.

Kylo holds out his hands.  “How do I look?”

Hux sets the datapad down on the table and stands up.  With his arms crossed, he surveys Kylo up and down.  Then, Hux steps forward and tugs down on Kylo’s white uniform top once before adjusting his belt. 

Hux presses his hands against Kylo’s chest.  “There,” Hux says, looking up at him. 

Kylo puts on his hat.  Then, from underneath the cap visor, he winks.

Hux turns away with a not-so-well-hidden eye roll.  That only makes Kylo snicker into his gloved fist. 

On their way to the cockpit, Kylo feels the ship shudder out of hyperspace.  The cockpit windows now only show stagnant stars.  In front of them is Canto Bight, twinkling with its many lights.  From this distance, Kylo can see the planet’s artificial sea.  Such an indulgence, for the planet is nearly all desert.

Hux pilots down to the open-air landing pad, twinkling in red and green lights.  After he settles the ship down, Hux shuts her off and heads off to the unloading bay.  Kylo follows.

They round the corner, Kylo spots two of the lieutenants and Hux immediately sighs with a “For the love of Empire” underneath his breath.

Kylo doesn’t see much wrong with Hux’s lieutenants, but apparently Hux does because he launches into an impressive scolding.

“How many times, Lieutenant Mitaka,” Hux says, irritated.  “Do I have to tell you not to smoke cigarettes before political functions?”

Mitaka’s shoulders hunch before he mutters something under his breath.  He’s carrying a black duffel bag on his shoulder.  The lit cigarette smolders between his gloved fingers.  He puts it out against the wall of the ship.

Hux huffs.  “Well you don’t see _me_ chain smoking before these things.”  Then, Hux frowns, trying to look at the lieutenant’s face from their considerable height difference.  “And what’s that on your face?”

Kylo hears Cecylia cough into her fist.  Unlike the rest of them in the room, she’s dressed like Kylo has seen senators dress in the New Republic.  Tight black pants with a white flowy shirt tucked into them.  A gold belt separates the two.  She wears a long, dark red cape, similar to the one Kylo wears with his usual garb.  Her blonde hair rests loose and curly around her shoulders.

“By the seven sisters,” Kylo hears Hux say.  “I just saw you hours ago! How did this happen?” He gestures at all of Mitaka.

Mitaka looks up then to stare at Hux.  From this angle, Kylo can see bruising curling around his eye, darkest on the socket itself. 

Hux sighs.  “When?” he simply asks.

“Last night.”

“How?”

“It was a sparring accident.”

“Why?”

Mitaka can only shrug.

Hux looks to Cecylia.  “Any reason you had to punch him in the face?”

Cecylia holds up her gloved hands.  “Don’t look at me.  Parnew was the one who left that mark.”

Hux’s eyes widen before he turns to Mitaka with a harsh look.  “You better not have left any marks on _her_.”

Mitaka shrinks into himself.  “No, sir.”

Hux’s face twitches again before he turns away.  “Where is she anyway?’ he says, pulling out his comm.  He walks to the other side of the room and starts typing into his comm.

Kylo follows, but he still catches a bit of Mitaka and Cecylia’s interaction, which involves Cecylia whispering something into Mitaka’s ear and Mitaka flashing her with a hand gesture Kylo usually doesn’t see outside smuggler bars.

Kylo smothers his laugh by turning it into a cough.

Hux doesn’t have to wait long, for Cassini Parnew shows up not even a minute later.  She’s dressed in a tight gown, one that is blue and embroidered with what must be constellations.  They glitter against the blue fabric and her dark skin.  Her tightly braided hair is in the half-up, half-down style that Kylo wishes he was wearing instead of the low bun regulation calls for.  Silver bracelets resembling wrist guards adorn Parnew’s dark wrists.

Kylo sees Cecylia lean down to whisper something yet again into Mitaka’s ear, who responds by flushing scarlet and elbowing Cecylia in the ribs.  Cecylia winces, but snickers too.

Hux counts them all, for some reason, before nodding to himself.  “Everyone knows the plan, right?  Any last thoughts?”

“I’m ready to kiss ass, sir” Cecylia says.

Hux nearly ages ten years from that comment.  “Great.  All right.  Let’s go.”

Then, he pulls the ramp lever and they’re all blasted by the lights and sounds of Canto Bight.

* * *

Lights glitter in every window and across thin strings of lights across the walkway from the landing pad to the entrance into the massive casino.  The time difference between the _Finalizer_ and Canto Bight mean they arrived here at night, with everyone around them dressed in evening wear.  Kylo tries to focus on the faint instrumental music he hears coming from the casino, something light and airy, but is instead drawn back to Hux’s loud conversation with Lieutenant Parnew, which soon turns into a loud conversation with Lieutenant Mitaka after Hux brings up his bruising and limping. 

It’s a rather heated discussion.  Next to Kylo, Cecylia raises her arms and moves her arms to follow along with Mitaka’s own gesturing.  It makes Kylo snicker silently.

As they get close to the gala entrance, Mitaka splits off and heads down an alley.  Parnew follows him out of the corner of her eye.

“Where’s he going?” Kylo asks Cecylia.

“Probably the roof,” she says nonchalantly.

Kylo eyes the steep structure.  “Uh.”

Cecylia laughs.  “Ha!  Just kidding.  Hux told him no.”

Kylo doesn’t know how to respond to that, so he just keeps walking.  They soon approach a great gilded door with various animals and plants etched into the metal.

Hux pauses to talk to the guard at the door.  His circlet glitters in the spaceport’s artificial light. 

With a nod, the guard talks into his wrist.  Then, the doors open, and Kylo is swept inside.

Kylo has been to many political functions in his past, both with the First Order and the New Republic.  But he’s always surprised by the opulence of every party, of every ballroom, like each one is trying to one-up the other.  This casino is no different.

Amora Cohn’s party shimmers with lights that hang suspended by what appears to be nothing.  The lights reflect off the dark blue walls, turning them a light blue like a cloudless sky.  Kylo can see numerous paintings in golden frames adorning the walls, though their subject material only looks like a collection of colors from distance.  A stage in the middle of the room splits it into two sections.  There are numerous gambling tables set up with large crowds jostling around them.  From cheers and groans, Kylo can tell most people here are having mixed fortune with their own fortunes.

The thick smell of cigarette and spice smoke permeates the large room.  Behind that, Kylo can smell something savory, like the stew Hux made for them before they left.  It makes his stomach growl, reminding him that he never ate breakfast and that here, it’s already dinner. 

Their party descends the carpeted stairs.  Cecylia and Parnew are already scoping the room while Hux’s attention is drawn to the paintings.  Now, Kylo can see that there are numerous sitting areas, too, where people eat, drink, smoke and talk, surrounding a central dance floor.  Couples of various peoples already glide across the floor in various glamorous outfits.

“You take left, I take right?” Kylo hears Cecylia ask Parnew.

“Sounds good.  Switch off in one?”

“Perfect.”

Then, they pass by Kylo and Hux and walk over to their respective sides.  Somehow, they both run into someone they know, who stands to greet them with a kiss to their cheeks.

“It’s always strange to see them do it,” Hux says.

“Do what?” Kylo asks.

Hux gestures to each of his lieutenants.  “Slip into that mindset.  They’re good at this.  Better at transforming themselves into the people they need to be to get the results they want.”

Kylo hums.  He looks to Hux.  “I think we can handle our own,” he says with a small smile.

Hux doesn’t smile back.  His posture somehow straightens further.  “I hope so,” he says.

They soon sink into the politics of the party.  Kylo is familiar with this process, as he spent many years trailing his mother as she courted favor for her new rebellion with the war-weary citizens of the New Republic.  Though short, Leia Organa had a way of capturing people with her presence.  Kylo, by her side as the little boy sired by victory, was able to hide quite effectively in her dresses. 

Kylo doesn’t do this.  His Force powers are refined now.  He can dip into the minds of the party guests without them noticing, thanks to Snoke’s training.  His master said the Force is a tool.  Something only the well-taught could wield.  That was why Kylo spent so much time with the Force and the Force alone.  That was power, not knowing how to swing a lightsaber.  Anyone could learn that.  The power of Force belongs to them alone.

Kylo sees some worth to what Snoke says, even though he doesn’t completely agree.  With each party guest, Kylo can predict their opinions on politics, on the First Order, on Hux, on Hux’s Arkani artifact perched atop his ahead, even on Kylo himself. 

A normal conversation went like this.

“General Hux,” a party guest would say.  Their bodies would be adorned in motifs of teeth, claws, flowers and antlers.  Their faces were painted in dramatic cat-eyes and in blood-red swirls across cheeks.  Gold jewelry lay across their chests and around their wrists and in their ears.  “What an honor to meet you.”

Hux would smile tightly, though graciously.  Sometimes, to the ones he knew were powerful, he would duck his head.  The crown would shine.  After saying their name and title, Hux would say, “An honor to meet you as well.  It has been so long since I’ve had a good party.  I’m happy to share it with you all here.”

A bit heavy-handed, Kylo thought, but effective on these self-important people.  Absorbed in the symbols and shininess of the two planets they were celebrating.  Kylo noticed that Hux never brought up the Arkani symbols on their fellow guests, though his eyes took note of each and every one (at least the ones Kylo knew).  The guests never asked Hux about his flowered crown either.  Just said it matched perfectly with his red hair.

Kylo would be introduced next.  He would follow Hux’s lead, bowing his head when he did and not when he did not.  While Hux rang off his importance in being apprentice to the Supreme Leader of the First Order, Kylo would dip into the guests’ minds.  He would find what he needed to know to get into their good graces. 

Then, when it was Kylo’s turn to speak, he would smoothly transition to whatever the guest was most interested in.  The rising and falling currency values in Ursi Majora.  The fathier races here on Canto Bight.  Prostitution among First Order recruits in the spaceports and slums of the Unknown Regions.

Sometimes, Kylo and Hux would run into someone interested in the First Order itself.  Hux would then become a recruiter.  Information would be exchanged between Hux and the guest.  Hux would leave those conversations lighter on his feet, happy that the First Order would have a new place to look for supplies or soldiers or allies. 

After yet another dull conversation, Kylo and Hux escape to the buffet table.  Hux immediately sets on the bowl of punch in the center, then scoops up little cakes.  “Fuck, I didn’t realize how hungry I was until now.”

Kylo, though not hungry, follows Hux’s lead.  He’s only tired from the energy spent slipping into other people’s minds.  “Talking’s exhausting.”

Hux pops a cake into his mouth and moans at the taste.  He hums an affirmative to Kylo before carefully sipping from his punch.  “How’s everyone else looking?”

Kylo takes that to mean Hux’s lieutenants, so he looks around the room for them.  “Parnew and Cecylia have switched sides.”  In the distance, he can see both lieutenants entertaining a crowd.  Cecylia is telling a riveting story, involving ridiculous gesturing and all, while her group cackles around her.  Parnew, meanwhile, stands around a gambling table, listening intently to what a young man with a rather ridiculous mustache is saying to her.

“Do you see Mitaka?” Hux asks with his mouth full.  “Look in the shadows.”

Kylo takes that to mean the edges of the room.  Looking there, he spots Mitaka easily.  “He’s hiding in the corner.”

Hux looks at Mitaka, sulking in the corner next to what have to be bodyguards judging by their height, size and apparent temperament.  Mitaka fits in surprisingly well: arms crossed, leaned against the wall, surveying the room, though he’s tiny compared to most of them.

Hux shrugs.  “Well,” he says.  “At least he’s here.  And not talking to anyone.”

“Is he really that bad?”

Hux snorts.  “One time, this young lady mistook him for a gentler thing and grabbed his face with both hands and he…well…”

Kylo almost wants to ask what, but Hux points out a prominent crime boss in this sector of the Unknown Regions and trots off towards her.  Kylo follows Hux, back into the madness.

When Kylo walked the room with Leia Organa, she would whisper advice to him in between the long, boring conversations with those boring politicians.

“Old soldiers never want to wage war again,” Organa had said.  “Their children do.”

“Hope is like the sun.  Just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there.”

“People are here for themselves.  Be like them and win them over.”

Kylo’s mother was wrong about many things, but not about the last one.  As he and Hux assume the ideas of these people, Kylo with help from the Force and Hux through his perception and practice, these people trust them more and more.  Even though Hux reveals nothing more than surface level details and little white lies.

“I feel as though this visit was a benefit in more ways than one,” Hux says in between conversations.  “We’ve gained plenty even before the main part of the mission.”

Kylo nods but thinks back to his argument with Hux the night before.  How Hux closed himself off so tightly when Kylo asked to know more. 

He wonders if he’ll ever really know Hux.  These fake people obviously will never.  But Kylo wants to.  So desperately.  Any information Hux gives him, like his ability to cook, Kylo hoards like a magpie and its jewelry.

The flowered crown on Hux’s head glitters teasingly.  The information it holds is unknown to Kylo and will be until the time Hux decides.  If Hux ever does decide.

Lost in thought, Kylo follows Hux around the hall.  He almost doesn’t notice Hux stop and near runs over him.  He follows Hux’s eyes to what he stares at on the wall in front of them.

It’s a painting. 

The first thought that strikes Kylo is that it’s a colorful painting. 

The second is that the prominent colors are red, for that is the blood splattered in the painted grass and the bodies lying there, like the painter slung their paint across the canvas with little care.

The third thought Kylo has is that this is a battle on a planet he has never seen before. 

For the focus of the painting is a woman with long, dark black hair sitting in a saddle atop the back of a rearing deer.  The deer’s front legs kick out into the air.  The deer’s head, pulled back with its reins, bends towards its neck at an awkward angle.  Its face is wild, its mouth open to reveal a metal bit within, lodged between its teeth.  The deer’s eyes are blown black.  Blood is sticky on the animal’s back legs.

The rider, however, is much calmer.  There’s no expression on her clean face.  She holds a spear aloft in one hand while the other pulls the reins of her steed upward.  The rider’s leather armor bares her arms and legs, up to the upper thigh in slits to the short skirt, with strips of leather hanging down towards her calves.  She’s slender and pale.  There’s no blood on her, even though it stains the painting so terribly everywhere else.

Atop both the head of the deer and the rider are antlers.  They are of multiple colors, like gemstones smashed together into the pronged shape.  The woman’s antlers protrude from a headpiece crossing her forehead.  They curve upwards to the sky. 

Kylo looks for a title to the painting and finds one.

_The Rise of Great Aetheria_

“A splendid painting, isn’t it?” says a voice behind them

Kylo and Hux turn to see Amora Cohn, the target for their mission, standing smiling behind them.  She would almost appear gentle, but only if Kylo hadn’t seen the holo of her in the meeting last night.  Cohn wears a long blue dress, the color of ocean water, with a corset of what has to be antler around her waist.  Circling her neck is the necklace Hux and his lieutenants had said was imperative to their plan.  Kylo sees gold claws glittering from her fingertips as Cohn stretches out her hands towards Hux.

“General Armitage Hux,” Cohn says.  Hux clasps her hands in his own and lifts them to kiss a claw from each hand.  That makes her laugh as she pulls away.  She points a clawed finger at him.  “I’ve heard you’ve been charming your way through my guests this entire night.”

“Only talking, Lady Cohn.”

“Please, Amora.”

Hux bows his head.  “Of course, Amora.  Only talking.”

Amora smiles with teeth this time.  Kylo sees that her canines are tipped in gold, just like in the holo.  “Even that can be dangerous, with our power lying around.”  She inclines her head towards the portrait.  “I see you’ve discovered my greatest treasure of the night.”

“The painting is truly well-done,” Hux says.

Amora hums then.  “You’re not one for art, are you, Armitage?”

Kylo notices that Hux never gave her permission to use his first name, like she did for him. 

Hux doesn’t bother to correct her.  “I never did do well in my Imperial art classes,” he says.  “Never took to it like I did to other things.”

“Yes, like your engineering,” Amora says.  “Well.  Let me educate you on _The Rise of Great Aetheria_.  This was over fifty years ago.  When the Jedi and their Clones were waging war across the galaxy.”  Amora points at the people lying dead at the hooves of the deer.  Kylo can see lightsabers scattered along with blasters on the ground.  “They made the mistake to invade Aetheria.  That led to one of the Republic’s greatest defeats.”

“Didn’t the Empire also invade Aetheria?” Hux asks.

Amora raises her eyebrows.  “So someone _does_ know his Aetherian history.  Yes, the Empire invaded Aetheria much like the Republic did.  Again, they were unsuccessful due to the actions of this woman.”  She looks back to the painting.  “It took me years to even learn her name.  Dalla.  The Last of the Great Aetherians.  That is what the Unknown Regions whisper.  Now that Aetheria has finally fallen.”

Amora finally looks at Kylo then, but Kylo knows she saw him from the beginning.  Everything in this conversation is a calculation.   Kylo can sense it in the air.  “We have yet to be introduced.”  She holds out a hand.  “I am Amora Cohn, the lady of this party.”

Kylo kisses her hand like Hux did.  Her bare skin is soft on his lips.  “I am Kylo Ren, Lady, Master of the Knights of Ren and apprentice to Supreme Leader Snoke.”

“Forgive me for not calling you Master, Kylo Ren,” Amora says.  “I’m not a fan of calling men that title, especially here where I rule.”

Kylo blinks at the insinuation, but Hux only laughs gently.  Amora laughs too before hooking her arm through Hux’s.  “Walk with me, Armitage,” she says, blatantly ignoring Kylo. 

Hux looks back at Kylo and mouths “I’m fine” before leaning back into his conversation with Amora. 

Kylo frowns, angered even though he understands why Hux would need to charm her alone, before retreating back to the buffet table.

It doesn’t take long for someone else to join him.

“Tarkin’s balls, this is exhausting,” Cecylia says after chugging a cup of punch.  “Never have I seen so many people willing to suck up to the First Order.”

“Having luck with politics?”  Kylo asks tightly.

Cecylia nods.  “Some people.  Most are less interested in the First Order or the speeches I’ve written or the people I know.”

“And more interested in?” Kylo prompts.

Cecylia shrugs, then smirks bitterly.  “Me,” she says.  Then, Cecylia sets her cup down on the buffet table and glides away, her cape billowing around her.  As she walks, people surround her again.  She touches their faces and laughs at their comments, though Kylo can sense in the Force that none of it is genuine.

“That’s nowhere for someone to stand, alone,” Cassini Parnew says next to Kylo.

Kylo shrugs.  “Let’s say I’m taking a break.”

“No breaks here,” says Parnew.  She offers her hand to Kylo.  “Come with me.  Let’s dance.”

Kylo would rather do anything else, but there are eyes on him already.  Seeing if he’ll reject the pretty First Order officer. 

That wouldn’t be a good showing of respect.  Kylo and Hux worked hard to get these people in their favor.  He’d keep at it, even though he would rather not be touched.

Kylo takes Parnew’s gloved hand in his own and follows her to the dancefloor.  The band is playing a slower song now.  Parnew slides into a waltz as easily as she walks.  Kylo takes the lead, gliding her across the gala floor with her hand in his and his other on her waist.  He nearly can’t reach due to their height difference, even with the heels Parnew is wearing. 

Parnew’s hand is tiny in his but holds it firmly. 

They dance in silence for a while, listening to the music.  Kylo thinks Parnew is surprised that Kylo is such a skilled dancer.  Kylo is equally surprised with Parnew.

He voices that thought.

Parnew laughs delicately.  “You see, Commander,” she says.  “I found that I excelled in ballroom dance at my Academy.”

“I’ve heard of your family,” says Kylo.  “The Parnew name is well-known throughout the galaxy.  What your father did for the fledgling First Order, what your grandfather did for the Empire…well…let’s just say they shaped the galaxy.”

“I thank you for the compliments towards my family,” Parnew says graciously.  “Though I find myself taking after my mother more so than my father or grandfather.”

“How so?”

Parnew leads Kylo into a delicate twirl, so she passes under his arm.  “My mother is a skilled ballerina,” she says.  “So am I.”

Kylo raises an eyebrow.  Sure.  He’ll play her game of politics.  “Confident, are you?”

Parnew tilts her head with a smile.  She pulls Kylo to the right with a tight grip on his shoulder.  “I am.  In most things, Commander Ren.”

“Confident in politics?”

“Of course,” Parnew says.  “I speak men’s thoughts, so that they may continue to hold them in silence.”

“That’s not very Imperial of you.”

“No,” she says.  They spin around each other.  Parnew’s dress flares out.  Kylo notices that some men look towards him with envy.  “I’m sure you know the saying.”

“A Republic saying,” Kylo says.  “I believe Duchess Satine Kryze was fond of the phrase.  I’m surprised you’ve heard of her.  Do they teach such things at the Academy?”

Parnew shakes her head.  “You’ll find that us officers know a great deal more than we should.”  She looks down.  “Though we are hesitant to speak of those things.  Especially when it comes to our superiors.”

Any playful emotion leaves Kylo immediately.  “You’re talking about Hux,” Kylo quietly says.  “What do you know?”

“I know that you wonder about him,” Parnew says.

“Is that what you know or what you can say?”

Parnew’s eyes flash towards him.  Kylo is again reminded of her charge against Mitaka in the empty hangar aboard their shuttle here.  “What I say is often what I know.”

“Then you know nothing about Arkanis,” Kylo says.

Parnew’s eyes slide back into political politeness.  “I didn’t say that,” she says.  “I said often what I say is what I know.  Not all the time.”

“Stop playing games,” Kylo growls.

Parnew winces delicately, for Kylo is squeezing her waist.  Kylo lets go immediately.

“You’re the one playing a dangerous game, Commander.”

Kylo spins her around.  “Is that a threat?” he whispers into her ear as she passes by. 

Parnew shakes her head, though she looks slightly more rattled now.  She takes a deep breath and finally, finally looks Kylo in his eyes.  Without that political affectation that plagues these high-class Imperials, the ones sired by the Empire.

She leans in and pulls him down to press her lips to his ear.  They continue to sway.  Her body is warm against his. 

“It’s dangerous to go looking beyond the First Order, Kylo Ren.  Dangerous to question who someone is.”  Parnew pauses.  “Now laugh like I said something funny.”

Kylo does so, pressing his face into her hair, though there is little to be amused by.

“The First Order exists because we all play our part,” Parnew continues.  “There are no Arkani.  There are no Aetherians.  There are no mutt Imperials.  Haven’t you noticed?  As you walk the halls of the _Finalizer_ , don’t you see who we must be?”

Kylo does.  He sees it all the time in Hux.  As he walks the halls of the _Finalizer_.  As a general of the First Order.  Even alone with Kylo, Hux is rarely anything else.  They discuss troop movements.  They discuss tactics and strategies of the Imperials of old.  They talk about Vader and Tarkin and Sloane and other dead or disappeared men and women. 

The only time Kylo has seen Hux be anything else…is in his kitchen.  In the small table squished between the counter and a durasteel wall.  Not belonging.  Hidden from sight.

Parnew’s fear prickles at Kylo’s mind.  “Is he afraid?”

“Yes.”

“Of what?”

Parnew pulls away from him and lifts a hand to trail a gloved hand down his cheek.  “I wish I could be like you, Kylo Ren.  Able to ask such questions.”  

There’s emotion to her voice that Kylo hasn’t heard from her before.  Trying to break through.

“That wasn’t an answer,” Kylo says.  “What is he—?”

“Shhh,” Parnew says with a finger to his lips.  “Let me tell you a story.”

Kylo blinks.  “All right,” he murmurs against her finger.

Parnew removes her finger and inclines her head over towards the wall.  “You see Lieutenant Mitaka over there?”

Kylo nods to show he does see Mitaka, sulking against the wall, looking exponentially more irritable than he did when he and Hux last saw him. 

“Let me tell you a story about Lieutenant Mitaka,” says Parnew.  “When I first met him, he was the first person ever to see me as Cassini rather than a Parnew.  Funny, isn’t it?  You wouldn’t expect it from him.  We invaded his planet, after all.”

“What do you me—”

Parnew shakes her head.  “And yet, when I asked him to teach me about Aetheria, about the combat of her warriors, you know what he said to me?”  They’ve stopped dancing now.  Parnew is standing very close now.  “He didn’t say I shouldn’t learn combat, like the boys did at the Academy, because I was a lady.  He didn’t tell me no because my grandfather invaded his planet and caused grief for his family.  He could have, you know.  No, you know what he asked me?”

Kylo asks what.

Parnew gives a little laugh.  “He asked me ‘Why do you want to learn?’.  I nearly laughed in his face.  I was surprised.  Didn’t expect that question.  Didn’t know what to say.  He just stood there, waiting for answer.  And he gave me time, too.  Gave me a week to answer him.”

“So what did you say?” asks Kylo.

Parnew’s eyes are very bright.  “I said to Mitaka, ‘You know why I want to learn?  Because I know that who you are is not who I know, and I want to know who you are’.”  She takes a deep breath.  “That same yearning?  I see it in you.  For the general.”  Her breath shudders.  “And it is so _unbelievably_ dangerous.  For him especially.”

“I’ll keep him safe,” Kylo says.  His heart beats fast now.  “I will.”

But Parnew shakes her head.  “Even now, the First Order watches.  Why do you think I’m not dancing with Mitaka right now?  He’s terrible at it.  Can’t lead worth a damn.  But I still want to.  I’d lead for him.  I would.”  Parnew looks down briefly to collect herself before gazing back upwards at Kylo.  “And why do you think you’re not dancing with Hux now, when you wish to know who he is?  Isn’t it for the same reason?  Because you know, deep down, that there’s nothing you can do to keep him safe?”

Kylo searches for an answer, but before he can, a gong sounds, making Parnew snap back into her political serenity.  Kylo wishes for that skill as he lets go of her.  He tries to find Hux but doesn’t see his crowned head in the crowd.  His hands are sweaty in his gloves. 

Then, up on the raised stage in the center of the room, Kylo sees Amora Cohn.  She’s standing with her hands clasped in front of her, a smile on her face.  Even from this distance, Kylo can see her gold-tipped teeth glitter.

“My friends,” Amora says loudly.  Her voice echoes across the hall.  “I’m so thankful for you to join me today as we celebrate the cultures of two exquisite planets.”  This prompts a cheer across the room.  Kylo sees Parnew join in with polite clapping.  “But I must make an incredible announcement!  We have Arkani and Aetherians among us!”

The crowd roars.  Kylo is nearly made nauseous by their exuberant Force presence.  His head feel congested, but that feeling goes away when Amora speaks again.

“Because of this blessing,” Amora says.  “I must abandon you for some time.”  At the dismayed cries, Amora waves a hand.  “But worry not!  I’m vanishing to speak with these people, so that I may learn even more than what I know and spread my knowledge with everyone here.” 

Kylo hears something buzz in Parnew’s ear.  She pretends to scratch a phantom itch so that she may listen to the headset there. 

“For now, my treasures,” Amora says with her arms spread.  The antler corset around her waist gives her an hourglass figure.  Kylo thinks of her as a queen addressing her subjects, at this point.  “Eat of my food!  Drink of my drink!  And let the words flow like the rivers of Arkanis!”

In the resulting cheer, Kylo almost doesn’t notice Parnew grab his arm.  She’s speaking into the bracelet on her wrist.  “Meeting point Alpha, go ahead?”  Kylo hears Parnew’s earpiece buzz again, and then she’s pulling him along.  “Affirmative, on our way.”

In the cheering of the crowd, Kylo finds himself looking to the dark corner of the room where Lieutenant Mitaka stands.  He sees Mitaka press a hand to his ear, nod and then melt into the shadows like he is one and the same.


	5. Amora's Attraction

Parnew half-leads, half-drags Kylo to “meeting point Alpha”, whatever that means since she decides not to tell Kylo where they’re going.

Meeting point Alpha ends up being behind the stage wall.  There’s an illuminated door there leading into the stage itself.  It’s decorated with various flowers.  Hux stands with Cecylia nearby, in a darker part of the long hallway that extends into darkness on both sides.

Lieutenant Mitaka is nowhere to be seen.

Hux is checking his comm when Kylo and Parnew walk up.  He visibly relaxes when he sees the two of them.  “Parnew.  Ren.  Excellent.  Just a few minutes more.”

“How was talking with Amora?” Kylo asks.

Hux shrugs.  “Catering to her interests mostly.”  Then, he smirks, though it’s weakened by the anxiety Kylo can detect in his Force presence.  “Don’t worry.  I saved some for dinner.”

“Dinner?” Cecylia asks.  “You’re getting fed?”

Hux nods.  “Traditional Arkani course, I believe.  According to her, Aetherian cuisine is, like most things on that planet, a closely guarded secret.”

Kylo sees Parnew smile to herself as Cecylia groans.

“Great.  Now I’m regretting not going.”

“You’re not?” Parnew asks.

Cecylia shakes her head.  “Sorry, Parsnip, I’ve got a date with a rich old man who is so _very_ interested in my speeches.”

Parnew hides a laugh with a smile.  “Sorry to hear about your success.”

“Thanks.  I appreciate your sympathy.”

Just then, Kylo hears a small c _reak_ from just behind him.  He along with everyone else turns around to look, but he only sees darkness. 

Hux sighs.  “Come on out, Mitaka.  I know you’re there.”

A pause.  Then, “I thought I was being quiet.”

“Creaky floor.”

“Oh.”

Now visible, Mitaka doesn’t hide his steps.  Each one is heard now.  Kylo can even pick out a limp, though Mitaka is doing an excellent job to try and hide it.

Last Kylo saw Mitaka, he was sulking in a white First Order dress uniform, similar to Hux and Kylo’s minus decorations befitting a higher rank. 

Now, though, it’s as if Lieutenant Mitaka dismounted the deer in _The Rise of Great Aetheria_ and walked out of the frame to greet them here.  The only key difference is a plating of antler across the chest of Mitaka’s leather armor.  And the lack of multicolored antlers that adorn Mitaka’s head.  Those are nowhere to be seen.

Everything else is completely the same. 

Cecylia whoops.  “Yeah, sky’s out, thighs out, Mitaka!”

Kylo hears Hux sigh as Mitaka calls out “sun’s out, guns out!” in the same tone.

They’re both correct to say that.  It’s the most undressed Kylo has seen any First Order person in public and a bit strange to see.  Odd because it’s not like Kylo has been involved in the culture long, but still.  It’s made an impact.

Mitaka isn’t even wearing gloves.

One step is particularly difficult on Mitaka’s right leg, and he winces.  Kylo finds himself looking between the slits of the armor on his thigh and sees thick, gnarled scar tissue exposed with each swish of the leather skirt.  A cut-through strip of leather, one that must have extended down to Mitaka’s calves, further emphasizes the wound.  Kylo wonders if that’s the source of his limping.  It must be.  Kylo can’t think of why it wouldn’t be.

Just above sit curved daggers sheathed on Mitaka’s hips.  Kylo thinks they must be the ones from the sparring session he witnessed last night.

But he’s brought out of those thoughts by Hux again.  “The antlers?” he asks.

Mitaka brings his hand out from behind is back.  Clasped in his fingers is a headpiece like in the painting.  Leather with hints of bronze peeking through.  And curving out from either side of the stone: two pale antlers.  Smaller than what Kylo expected and made of bone, but the painting had small ones too.  He wants to ask why the antlers curve out of the forehead, when deer have antlers on the side of their head but decides not to press Mitaka.  He’s already looking anxious again, even with his and Cecylia’s joking around.

“What’s the problem?” Hux asks as Mitaka stares down at the antlers in his hand.

Mitaka frowns.  “It doesn’t feel right.”

“What doesn’t?”

“Being dressed for battle,” he says.  “When there’s no battle to be fought.”

Parnew speaks up then.  “Is politics not a battle with strategy and strife?”

Mitaka tilts his head.  “Lionora Valdex?”

Parnew shakes her head, but she’s smiling.  “Sorry.  Idrina Maria.”

Mitaka tsks at himself.  “Maria…”  Then, with one final look at his antlers, he slips the headpiece onto his forehead.  The ends tuck under his hair, which is loose and wavy, unlike the usual pomade look that the First Order requires.

When Mitaka looks up, the antlers curve upwards and outwards.  He looks to Parnew with a small smile.  “I’ll remember those words when I go in.”

“Parnew, are you staying with us?” Hux asks.  “It’s not required, but your family name did register with Amora.  It could be helpful.”

Parnew hums.  “I don’t have anyone else to talk to.  I had some luck with minor missions, some support for food alliances and the like, but nothing war-changing.”

Cecylia claps her hands.  “All right!” she says.  “Guess I better go then.”  She waves at Hux, who nods back.  She and Parnew clasp hands.  Then, she approaches Mitaka.

“Good luck, Aetherian,” she says with a light tap with two fingers to an antler prong.

“Thank you, Imperial,” Mitaka says back.

Then, Cecylia is gone, leaving Kylo, Hux, Parnew and Mitaka behind.  They head to the illuminated door in the center of the hallway.  Where Amora must await them.

“Any hints for me, Hux?” Kylo asks.

“I trust your judgement,” Hux says.  “She isn’t very interested in you but keep your guard up.  Remember that.”

Kylo nods.  Vague, but broad.  He can work with that.

Snoke’s orders of non-interference swirl in his mind.  Kylo doesn’t want to disobey him.

“Parnew,” Hux says.  “Run interference if possible.  She’ll be more interested in you than Ren.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Remember the plan, Mitaka?” Hux asks.

“Yes,” says Mitaka.  “Stand here.  Wait for the signal from you.  Walk in.  Discuss Aetheria.  Answer her questions.  Slip out once discussions begin.”

Hux nods and lifts his hand like he too is about to tap his antler.  But a second later, he lowers it to instead knock on the illuminated door.  Kylo sees Parnew whisper something to Mitaka that makes his eyes widen before he notices the door opening and slips back into the shadows with a muttered curse.

The open door shines little light into the hallway.  Amora Cohn stands in the doorway, looking at Hux with greater interest than when Kylo last saw her.  “Armitage,” she says.  “Welcome.  I’d offer you some traditional Arkani tea, but I’m afraid that commodity is hard to find on market, even black.”  She steps aside to let Hux enter.  Kylo and Parnew trail after him. 

Hux laughs gently.  “Quite all right, Amora.  I’ve never liked the tea anyway.”

Amora laughs too.  “Good for me then.  Come in, come in,” she says, waving her arm.  “Here, sit down, on the pillows here.  Traditional Arkani setup and everything.”

Kylo sees Hux’s eyes sadden for just a second before that slips under his political politeness. 

Amora just notices Parnew then.  “And you, my dear,” she says, clasping Parnew’s hands in her own.  “You must be of Aetheria.  A daughter of the Great Mother.”

But Parnew shakes her head.  “I’m sorry, Lady Cohn.  My name is Cassini Parnew.  I heard you knew my family and wish to pay honor to you.”

Amora’s disappointment is swiftly hidden under delight.  “Oh, Cassini!  Yes, I remember reading of your birth.  And of your success at the ballet.  Please tell me you still dance.”

“I do, Lady.”

Amora waves a hand.  “Enough of that, Cassini.  It’s Amora for my friends here.”

Parnew smiles tightly.  “Of course.  Amora.”

They all sit down on their pillows.  Once settled, Amora turns to Hux.  “Now, Armitage, if Cassini is not the Aetherian you know…who is?  And where are you hiding them?”

Hux laughs again.  Kylo thinks Hux has laughed more in this night than in the two years he’s known him.  “Perhaps I’m selfish and wish to talk about Arkanis first?”

“After the first course, then,” says Amora.  She gestures to the closed bowls in front of them.  “A traditional seaweed soup, with shredded clam meat and watercress.”

Kylo sees Hux’s eyes again sink into sadness when he takes off the soup cover, but that’s quickly hidden once more.  Especially after he takes a sip directly from the bowl, as there are no spoons provided.  Instead, Hux smiles to himself, almost a real one.

Intrigued now, Kylo too takes a sip.  The soup is salty, but there’s freshness too from the watercress.  The clam meat is decadent.  Sweet like Chandrilan salmon. 

Amora takes a sip from her soup.  Then, she pauses, looking at Hux’s circlet.  “Don’t tell me,” she says.  She sets down her soup.  “Arkani made, of course.  Copper.  A ceremonial circlet to be worn in times of worship to one of the Seven Sisters.  Must be very old, too.”

Hux inclines his head.  “You would be correct.”

Amora claps her hands once in glee.  “And what an exquisite piece it is!  I must ask where you found this treasure.  I’d say it’s up there with my own necklace, and that took a pretty credit out of my account.”

Hux pauses ever so briefly before he continues.  “This circlet has been on the maternal side of my family for a long time.  I believe it first belonged to my great-great-aunt.  She was a skilled blacksmith and forged it herself.”

Amora holds out her hand.  “May I?”

In the Force, Kylo senses Hux’s revulsion at letting her touch his family’s jewelry.

But, like before with his name, Hux says nothing.  He takes his circlet off and gives it to Amora next to him. 

Amora holds it up to the dim light in the center of their pillow circle.  “Magnificent craftsmanship.”  She holds it out to Parnew, on her other side.  “Look at the delicate detailing on the flowers.  How they each have unique petal wrinkles.”  She looks back to Hux.  “Tell me, what do the flowers mean?”

Hux blinks.  Then, he laughs nervously.  “Forgive my ignorance, Amora.  I never did find out what they meant.”

Amora laughs delicately.  “That’s quite all right, dear.  In my travels, I’ve studied much of the Arkani flower language.”  She tilts the circlet this way and that way.  “Azaleas.  Aubrietas.  Some marigolds, too.  Yes, this is a circlet of love.  The azaleas are for romantic love.  Aubrietas for platonic love.  And marigolds…well…those are for sexual love.”

Amora winks at Parnew.  She responds by laughing a bit awkwardly.

Hux clears his throat.  “Well, it would make sense for my great-great aunt to have it, then.  She must have loved people in her life, to have children.”

“Do you know your relatives?” Amora asks.  “Outside the immediate, that is?”

Hux shakes his head.  “No.  I was young when I left Arkanis.”

Amora looks at Hux with pity.  “No wonder you don’t know the flower language.”

Before they continue onwards, the next course is brought out.  Then, as they chat and chat, the next course is brought out.  Kylo eats many delicious foods, fish and mussels and waterfowl and seaweed and plants. 

He does have to admit that, with each meal, it only makes him yearn for Hux’s waterfowl stew with vegetables more and more.

“Now, Armitage, for my last question,” Amora asks.  “Tell me of your faith, if you can remember.  Am I right to say that Arkanis has seven main goddesses?”

“You’re correct,” says Hux.  “My people worshiped Taygeta, the great cat goddess.”

“The second youngest?”

“Yes?”

“Older than the Great Mother, the deer goddess of Aetheria?  The youngest of the Arkani pantheon?”

Hux shifts in his pillow.  “Yes, Amora.”

Amora smiles.  “This is my cue for you to bring out the Aetherian, Armitage.”

Hux sits up.  “There is something I would like to discuss first, Lady Cohn.”

“Don’t think I don’t know, General Hux,” Amora says.  “I’ve known for a while why you’re here and why you’re being so open with your heritage when my sources say you’re Imperial through and through.  Bring out the Aetherian.  Then we talk.”

Kylo moves to sit up, but Hux shoots him a stern look.  He purses his lips and looks at Parnew.  She too looks disconcerted.  This wasn’t the plan, for Amora to know so soon.

Hux scowls before he speaks into his wrist.  Seconds later, there’s a knock on the door.

Amora stands.  “Cassini,” she says, waving at Parnew.  “Let them in.”  Then, she stands and turns around to face the other way.  She wants it to be a reveal.  A dramatic thing.

Parnew looks to Hux.  He nods at her.  She stands and clicks her way to the door.  When she opens it and lets Mitaka step through, she leans down the inch-difference between their heights and whispers something into his ear.  Mitaka frowns at the ground before he turns, carefully with the antlers so close to Parnew, and whispers something back.

“Come forward, Aetherian,” Amora says.  She’s still facing the other way.  “Step into the circle, so I may look upon you.”

Mitaka looks to Hux.  Hux nods and waves him forward.

Before doing so, Mitaka shakes his antlers at Parnew.  That makes her nervous expression give way to a small smile.  Then, she lets Mitaka pass in front of her, so that he steps silently into the circle of pillows.  The strips of leather around his waist move with every step.  So do the knives at his hips.

When Amora doesn’t turn after a couple of seconds of Mitaka standing there, he shuffles one booted foot on the ground. 

That makes Amora turn, arms outstretched, ready to greet her visiting Aetherian like she addressed her guests on stage.

But any bravado disappears once Amora sees who stands in the circle.

She’s quiet for a time, looking Mitaka up and down as he stands there waiting.  Every once in a while he’ll jerk his head up, likely getting used to the weight of the antlers on his forehead.

Then, Amora steps into the circle.  Mitaka tilts his head to the side.  Not nervous yet, like Kylo expected from someone so skittish.  Appraising.  He’s different, in this uniform.  Perhaps, like the mask Kylo likes to wear sometimes, it serves as a source of strength in times of fear.

“I don’t even have to look at your armor, child,” Amora says quietly.  She reaches out to grab Mitaka’s wrist.  On each is a wrist guard similar to his chest armor.  Dark leather with antler decorating the outside.  “I can see it in your eyes.  Dalla lives in you.”

“As I’d hope,” Mitaka says.  “She’s my great-grandmother.”

That prompts a gasp from Amora as she pulls Mitaka down to kneel with her in the middle of the pillow circle.

Kylo, meanwhile, tries to understand how the woman heroically atop a rearing deer in the painting outside is the great-grandmother of the First Order lieutenant who kneels in front of him.

He looks at Hux and Parnew, but neither are surprised.  They both only look tense as they eye Mitaka and Amora.

With a hand still clutching Mitaka’s wrist, Amora looks to Hux.  She smiles her gold-tipped canine smile.  “I can see why you kept her secret, Armitage.  What a powerful card to have in your possession.  I would have done anything to even meet her.”

Mitaka looks more uncomfortable with every passing word.  “Um,” he says.  “I actually prefer—”

“You must tell me your name,” Amora interrupts.  “All of Dalla’s children have been lost to time.  I must know who carries her legacy.”

Mitaka pushes down whatever thoughts he had on the misgendering.  “They call me Dopheld.”

Amora near coos.  “A field of doe.  Of course.”  She starts stroking her thumb up and down Mitaka’s hand.  “A beautiful name for a beautiful gi—”

“Dopheld has been serving on the _Finalizer_ since the Academy,” Parnew interrupts.  Amora turns to look at her, angry at being interrupted.  “He and his family joined us when he was a child.”

Mitaka mouths ‘thank you’ at Parnew as Amora processes what she just said. 

“So,” Amora says, still holding onto Mitaka’s wrists.  “You’re telling me Dalla’s family, the children of the Last of the Great Aetherians, was with the First Order the whole time?”  Then, she leans her head back to laugh.  “And I was searching slave gangs and merchant ships!”

Hux smiles tightly.  “Well, we are a lucrative organization.  With the skills, manpower and potential _technology to_ conquer much of the galaxy.  With the proper political support—”

Amora waves a hand at him.  “Save your spiel for later, Armitage.”  She turns back to Mitaka.  “For now, I need your story.”

Mitaka blinks.  “About what?”

Amora shrugs.  “We can start small.  How’d you earn your antlers?  You look rather young to have had a child.”

Mitaka near chokes on his inhale.  “Um, excuse me?” he asks weakly.

“Your antlers,” Amora says slowly.  “You had to earn them by giving life, correct?  You must have a child then, likely recently, though it really doesn’t look like it—”

Mitaka starts violently shaking his head.  “Um, no, no.  No!  None of that!  Um.  For…for my clan, giving life isn’t just about…babies.  I mean, it can be!  It was for my mother, after all, but…no.  No, I earned mine by saving my sister’s life years ago.  In the eyes of my Matriarch, that was giving life.”

Amora hums.  “I hadn’t thought about it that way.”

“It’s more common than you think,” Mitaka says.  “Especially when Aetheria was more violent and saving lives was more common than having them.”

Just then, Mitaka’s stomach loudly growls. 

Amora laughs good-naturedly.  “Well!  Seems like we should introduce you to dinner!  I apologize for the lack of Aetherian options, but…your culture is so closed off about everything!”

“Yes,” Mitaka says.  “We are.”

Kylo detects some pride in Mitaka’s tone.  After the conversation he just had, it would be valid.  Not even Hux shoots him a warning look.

So, the group settles back into dinner.  Amora makes Parnew move so that Mitaka is sitting next to her, but Kylo doesn’t think Mitaka is complaining much since he gets to sit next to Parnew and talk to her too, when Amora is occupied asking Hux question after question about Arkanis and dodging any attempt at talks in political alliances.

Kylo is fine to just listen.  It’s nice to not have the attention on him for once.

Too soon, dessert is served and eaten and there’s nothing else to do besides wait for Amora to further question Hux and Mitaka. 

Amora starts with Mitaka.  Kylo wonders if she’ll ever go back to Hux.  With one dip into Hux’s nervous mind, at odds with his serene face, Kylo wills the Force to keep Amora away from the general.

“Your armor,” Amora says.  “Is truly beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m surprised it’s so similar to Dalla’s in my painting.”  She reaches out to trail a claw down the antlers covering the leather armor of Mitaka’s chest.  “Only this is a real difference.  And yet, it serves no protective purpose.  This would easily break.”

Mitaka smiles good-naturedly, even though it’s forced.  “Aetheria values aesthetic over practicality often.  Especially for her warriors.”

“Must be how you got this,” Amora says.  She grabs Mitaka’s face in one of her hands.  The claws fan out around Mitaka’s eye, where Parnew’s bruising curls around his eye socket.  “Antlers don’t protect your head very well from bruising like this.”  With her other hand, she grabs onto the base of an antler, right below where the first prong sticks out like a curved spear.

Mitaka laughs nervously.  His hands moves towards his hips, at the daggers sheathed there, before he clinches them in the armor’s long leather strips.  Kylo can see his hands shaking.  “It was a good fight with a skilled opponent.  I’m glad to wear her mark on my skin.”

Just then, Mitaka and Parnew make split second eye contact.   Somehow, that’s enough to relax them both.  But barely.

Amora looks down at Mitaka’s hips.  “Not even those daggers could keep her off you?  Surprising.  I heard Aetherian warriors were skilled.”

Mitaka stiffens at the slight.  “We are.  But we all have weaknesses.”

Amora hums.  She trails one clawed finger up and down the antler.  The gold scrapes the bone.  “We do.”  She looks back to meet Mitaka head-on.  “I’m afraid mine is with you, fawn.”  She swipes a clawed finger down Mitaka’s cheek.  “Those daggers at your hips…I wish to see them.”

Beside Kylo, Hux noticeably tenses.

“They’re just weapons, Lady Amora,” Mitaka says a bit too nonchalantly.  He covers one with the hand that previously clutched his leather armor strips.

Amora shakes her head.  She tightens the hand on his antler and holds him in place, so there’s nowhere left for him to go.  Kylo sees Mitaka make that realization, as his eyes glaze over for no more than a couple seconds before he jolts back with Amora’s voice. 

“If there’s anything I know about Aetherians,” Amora says softly.  “It’s that everything they wear on their body means something.”  She pulls forward on the antler, bringing Mitaka closer to her face.  “Show me the daggers, Dopheld.  I want to see them.”

Mitaka’s eyes are very wide as he moves his hands to take hold of the hilt of each dagger.  When he unsheathes them, they make no dramatic _shring_ or any sound at all. 

Kylo’s first thought is that they’re shorter than the metal ones Mitaka wielded in his sparring with Parnew.

His second thought is that the blades aren’t a muted silver, a bright bronze or even dull durasteel. 

Instead, they are as multicolored as the antlers painted into _The Rise of Great Aetheria_.

“So the legends are true,” Amora says, staring down at the daggers clasped in Mitaka’s hands. 

Mitaka doesn’t speak.  He just nods once, jerky.  Barely a motion, since Amora still has him by the face and prongs. 

Next to Kylo, Hux doesn’t breathe.

As if the sheaths at Mitaka’s hips were Force-nulling, it’s only then that Kylo feels a thickening in the Force, like the winds and seas swirling around each other in a hurricane.  Mixing in with that is a sickly fear.  The opposing sensations make Kylo nauseous.  He quickly pulls away from the Force, so that the hurricane and the fear only exist as soft rain and nervousness at the edge of his consciousness. 

“Tell me, Dopheld,” Amora says quietly.  There’s an edge of danger to her tone now that reminds Kylo that she’s lasted this long in the politics of Canto Bight for a reason.  “Do these daggers come from the antlers of the deer your great-grandmother rode?”

Though his fear is strong in the Force, Mitaka doesn’t look away.  He doesn’t blink.  He’s near emotionless as he says, “Yes.”

“The deer that rode against the Republic and Empire alike?”

“Yes.”

Amora pauses before she asks, even quieter, “And these are the weapons you were initiated with, when you earned your armor and your antlers and the knowledge of your foremothers?”

“I was told my family’s history.”

Amora shakes her head, then shakes Mitaka’s head for him.  “Not told.  Shown.”

A flash of fear comes through Mitaka’s eyes before it’s smoothed away.  But Amora sees it.  Because she smiles as if she’s won something.

She releases Mitaka’s face.  Kylo can see faint imprints from the gold claws on the delicate skin around his eye.  Mitaka touches the antler Amora held with one shaking hand. 

“Armitage,” Amora says, pulling Kylo away from Mitaka to look at Hux, who must do the same thing to look at Amora.  “I know your plan.  To build a better star destroyer, a better TIE fighter.  One more powerful than any Imperial could ever dream of.  To rule the galaxy under an engine that harnesses the power of the sun.”

She walks over to rest a clawed hand on Hux’s shoulder.  And Kylo wants so desperately to throw her off him, but Snoke’s orders echo in his mind.  Observe only.  Do not act. 

“And I do want to help,” Amora says.  “I believe the First Order needs something new, something that’ll make the New Republic quiver where they stand.”  She sighs.  “But, like all things in life, every action must come with its reaction.  It would be against the code of the universe to give you this for free, Armitage.  I request fair payment for my gifts to you.  This political and financial support you so desperately need.”

“And what price is that?” Hux asks tightly.

Kylo sees Mitaka look back up.  There’s something new swirling in his Force presence.

Amora takes a long time to answer.  “I wish to know Dalla’s power.  I wish to see her in her charge against the Republic.  Against their clones and their Jedi.  I want to be within her as she charges against the enemies of Aetheria.  I want to know her like I know myself.”

“No.”

Mitaka’s voice is strong.  He’s standing now.  His daggers are held tightly in his hands, down by his thighs. 

Amora turns to Mitaka with her teeth bared in a smile.  “Excuse me?”

But Mitaka isn’t looking at her anymore.

He’s looking at Hux.

“This wasn’t the deal,” says Mitaka.  “I was to tell my story.  Not show.”

“How dare you?” Amora near yells.  “I order you to—”

Mitaka lifts a dagger and points it at her.  Something flashes dangerously in his eyes.  Whatever fear is gone.  No, tucked somewhere deep inside.  Kylo can still feel it in the Force.  It’s fear that provokes this anger.  “You are _not_ my Matriarch,” Mitaka says harshly.  “You do _not_ give me orders.”

“On this spaceport, I am queen and so _do_ command you.”

Mitaka barks a single bitter laugh.  “The Aetherian queens are dead, Imperial, didn’t you fucking know?”

“Cirova.”

Hux’s voice interrupts Mitaka and Amora both.  Amora simply because she’s watching Mitaka, who flits in between that anger he’s holding onto so desperately and a nothingness that makes Kylo feel sickly in the Force.

Parnew’s eyebrows furrow at what Hux just said.

Mitaka’s voice is very soft.  “ _Qua lo quiaras, Armitage_?”

He isn’t speaking Basic.  The language though…it’s familiar to Kylo.  Like he heard it in a dream.

“ _Emahim si lo quiaras_ ,” Hux says back in that lyrical language.  “ _Neva pars neva._ ”

Kylo sees Parnew mouth something to herself.

 _Snow for snow_.

Kylo doesn’t know whatever Hux and Mitaka said to each other.  All he knows is that it makes Mitaka lower his dagger away from Amora.  “I don’t like it,” he says.  “And you haven’t _earned_ it.”  Mitaka looks back at Amora with distaste.  “But I will show you my great-grandmother.  In the way she showed me upon my initiation.”

Amora turns from resentment to adoration in an instance.  “You are so gracious, Dopheld, to show me this.  What do you need for the ritual?  I can get you anything.”

Mitaka shakes his head.  He sits down in the middle of the circle, so that Parnew sits right next to him and Kylo and Hux sit across.  Amora follows his lead.  “No.  This requires nothing but the antler daggers.  And me, to guide you.”

“Because you know the Mother?” Amora asks.

“Because the deer knows me,” Mitaka answers.  “Because she’d throw you and your destroyed mind from her own the second you tried to see through her.”

Mitaka sets his daggers on the ground.  One blade faces towards him.  The other faces towards Amora.

Amora breathes quickly now.  Mitaka sets his hand on one dagger, then pulls her hand to curl around the other.  “And now what?” she asks.

“Now,” Mitaka says.  “I must ask you a question.  One posed to me by my Matriarch before my initiation into the clan.

“Why do you want to learn?”

Kylo is suddenly reminded of his conversation with Parnew.  When he looks to her, she’s looking at Mitaka with a question on her lips.  But she holds it back, looking down.

Amora must have expected that question.  Or at least have been thinking about it herself for such a long time.

“I must know Dalla beyond the stories and paintings I have.  I must know her power, so I too can hold it for myself.”

Kylo thinks he sees disappointment flash across Mitaka’s face before he nods.  “Thank you for your answer.”  He takes Amora’s hand and places it on his antler, though with great hesitance.  Then, Mitaka reaches out and places his hand on Amora’s stomach on top of the deer antler corset. 

Amora looks up to the ceiling with a smile on her face.

“Don’t let go of me, when we enter the antlers,” Mitaka says.  “You lose me and I can’t get you out.”

“Of course, Matriarch,” Amora whispers.

Kylo sees Mitaka visibly jerk at the title.  But Amora doesn’t notice.  Her eyes are closed in near rapture.

Mitaka closes his eyes.  Just as soon, he opens them again.  Something glints in them again. 

He looks next to him at where Parnew sits.  Amora still has a hold on him, but his eyes are for her.  “It’s all right, Cassini,” he says.  She looks up, surprised.  Mitaka then gives her a small smile.  “You may watch.”

She nods.  Mitaka turns back to the daggers.  To Amora.

Kylo notices he doesn’t extend the invitation to him or Hux, but they both watch regardless.  Hux, Kylo notices, doesn’t appear surprised with what he sees.  He only scratches at his palms through his gloves.

Mitaka tilts his head.  He whispers under his breath, something Kylo can’t hear.

But in the Force…Kylo feels.  A weight to the air he breathes.  Not suffocating, but present against his body.  The sharp scent of ozone.  Crackling.  Like a fire.  No, like a short-circuit.  The rushing water of a flooded street.  River water.  An ocean, ebbing and flowing. 

A beat of something striking the ground. 

Something breathing against his shoulder.

Kylo jerks to look behind him, but there’s nothing there.  Only the dark walls of this hidden room on Canto Bight.

A ringing fills his ears now.  High-pitched like a mosquito.  No, low-pitched like the hum of a lightsaber.  Calling something to him.

Kylo strains to listen. 

Then, in the Force, Kylo hears something.  It says to him, “Close your eyes.  Breathe with me.”

A breath against his neck.  Goosebumps rise.  Kylo’s hair flutters.

“Close your eyes,” the Force says.  “Breathe with me.”

Kylo closes his eyes.  He breathes with the breath against his neck.

The air he breathes is hot.  There’s a sharp scent of spice.  Cigarette smoke.  The leftovers of their meal.

Kylo exhales all this.  Releases it to the Force. 

Around him, the air grows cold.  It bites at the exposed parts of his skin.  The rope scrapes his bare palms raw.

Kylo keeps his eyes closed.  Inhales cold air that wakes his shivering body up. 

He must keep going. 

There’s a buzzing in his ear that says. 

“Open your eyes.”

Kylo opens his eyes to snow.


	6. The Rise of Great Aetheria

Kylo squints against the assaulting snow flurries.  The rope he clings to is stiff under his fingers and legs.  His body stopped shivering what feels like hours ago. 

The wind howls louder.  The leather strips of his armor flail out with the wind.  So does his long hair.  Kylo smacks it away, snarling at it.

Kylo knows if he doesn’t hurry, he’ll be spotted.  Already the sun rises in the east.

He continues his ascent.  Kylo often has to stop to remove his wrist gauntlets from the fraying rope. 

Sometimes, Kylo looks down.  That makes him freeze until the static in his ears brings him back to the mission.

The window above him, his target, grows bigger.  Soon it’s big enough to grab.  Kylo heaves himself up onto the sill and pushes the window up.  Then, he pulls himself in, making sure to leave room for his head.  He lands on the floor on the balls of his feet.  No one heard a sound. No one knows he’s here.

The static in his ear starts up again.  Kylo ignores it as he closes the window.

Kylo has landed in the bedroom.  Just like they told him.  Just like he planned.  He sneaks across the wood floorboards, making sure not to let even one creak.  Sources say the family has been expecting something like this for a while.

Soon, Kylo makes it to the bed in the corner of the room.  There’s a lump curled up under the blankets.  Just as expected.

Kylo reaches towards his hips and unsheathes one dagger.  It would be easier to just stab the target now, but these curved knives aren’t for stabbing.  And besides: orders call for something clean.  Something with a reveal.

Kylo grabs one edge of the plush comforter.  He holds the dagger close by.  A clean cut.  No screaming.  A quick death.  It’s a kindness the First Order is rare to give.

Kylo pulls back the comforter and shoves his dagger against the target’s neck.

Then, Kylo is shocked into inaction.

For lying in the bed isn’t anyone he’s seen before.  Not in any mission briefing.

It’s a young girl.  Her face is relaxed in sleep, even with the dagger pressed against her neck.  She breathes deeply.  Kylo can see a drool stain on her pillow. 

Kylo starts to breathe hard. 

This wasn’t the plan. 

These aren’t his orders.

They can’t be.

The static is back in Kylo’s ear.  Voices ordering him to finish the mission.

But Kylo doesn’t hear them.

The girl is waking up.  Slowly.  Her eyes scrunch up.  Then, she blinks blearily up at Kylo.

Kylo’s dagger shakes in his hand.

The girl looks down at the dagger in Kylo’s hand, pressed against her neck.  Then, back up at him.  Her eyes are wide with fear.

Kylo feels hot tears gather in his eyes as someone screams in his ear to carry out the mission, carry it out or you’re dead!

But he can’t.  He _can’t_.

Kylo draws his dagger back.  He sees the girl slide her hand under her pillow.  She hasn’t blinked once.  Her face is so familiar.  Kylo sees it so often in the mirror, in his sisters.  He follows the girl’s movements because she’s _him_ , oh Great Mother, please let her live!

Then, the girl moves.  There’s a short blade glittering out of her hand as she roars a high-pitched roar.  Kylo tries to block it with his dagger, but he’s too late.

A burning pain erupts out his thigh.  It brings Kylo to the ground as he screams through his teeth.  The girl springs out of bed and sprints out the room, screaming the entire time.  The static in his ear is roaring.  The copper scent of blood is thick in the air.  Kylo looks down at his thigh and sees the girl’s knife hilt sticking out.  He sees that one leather strip has been cut clean through and sits on the bloody floor in front of him.

An alarm sounds in the building.  Loud, piercing. 

Kylo wants to pull the knife out and end it right here.

But he’s afraid too, as afraid as that little girl who stared up at him, so he pushes himself up and, in agony, limps to the window.  Kylo pushes it open and wraps himself around the rope, the way they taught him to make a quick escape.  Then, Kylo releases his grip and slides down the rope among the snow flurries and screaming alarms.  His palms burn as he descends. 

The ground is coming too fast.  Kylo tries to slow down, but there’s no use.  He hits the ground on his injured leg, and the pain is enough to make him black out and fall into the snow.

But Kylo’s thoughts aren’t darkness for long.

Images, thoughts, memories.  They flow past him, too quickly to be analyzed.  Only experience and experience them Kylo does.  But some do solidify.

Kylo sees a forest on fire.  Smells the burning heat and pants against the dryness in the air.  Someone is pulling him along, someone oddly familiar with black hair and dark brown eyes and flowers tucked behind his ear.  Kylo clutches his heavy, pregnant stomach as he runs away from blaster fire and the screams of the dying. 

In front of him, a deer runs in flames.  She’s screaming as she burns.

More images.  Here for a second, gone again.  Kylo can’t hold onto them for long.  They’re too many of them.  They’re too powerful.  The current flows heavy.

Kylo wanders the forest, giggling, looking for his mother.  She would be here at dawn, she told her eldest daughter.  To celebrate the death of the Imperials. 

But Kylo waited and waited and waited.  In the grove his mother put him in before she left on T’Mila’s back.  Most of the plants are dead from the winter cold.  But the sun is up and shining and finally warm and his mother wasn’t back.

She must be hiding from him.  Like the hide and find game they played on the plateaus. 

Kylo knows it’ll be harder to find his mother in the forest.  There are so many trees, not like on the plateaus with the dry grass and gnarled trees.  Though their leaves are gone, Kylo can’t see through them for his mother.  He has to keep looking.

And look and look Kylo does until he finds a running creek with ice floating on top of the water.  He follows this creek through the forest until he sees a clearing.  There’s a beautiful waterfall coming off the plateau.  Ice collects where the waterfall hits the gray rocks of the pool.

Of course!  Kylo’s mother would want to go home as soon as possible.  And they had to climb the cliffsides to get there.  Kylo knows there’s a path close by this waterfall.

“ _Matre!_ ” Kylo calls out.  “ _Matre,_ where are you?”

No response.  Kylo ducks under a low tree branch. 

“ _Matre,_ it’s Niabi!  Where are you?”

Kylo rounds the corner and gasps a laugh.

There’s his mother!  Sleeping with her deer on the banks of the pool.

She must have gotten tired after the death of the Imperials.

Kylo runs to her.  “ _Matre, matre!_ Are the Imperials dead?”

His mother doesn’t speak.  Her eyes are closed. 

One of her antlers has broken off.

Kylo reaches down to shake her awake.  Her head lolls back. 

Surrounding his mother is red ice.

A deep fear grips Kylo now.

“ _Matre?  Matre,_ wake up,” Kylo says.  He shakes his mother harder.  He’s kneeling on the ground in gravel, but he doesn’t feel the pain in his knees.  “ _Matre,_ wake up _!_ ”  His voice is clogged with tears.  “ _Matre!  Matre!_ ”  Kylo sobs now.  “ _Matre,_ please, wake up!” 

But his mother won’t wake up.  Her deer won’t wake up.

Kylo lifts his head to the sky and screams for as long as his little lungs can.

It’s not very long.

That image is torn from Kylo like the mother torn from his world.  More memories flash across his consciousness.  Phantom emotions.  Deep sorrow.  Fear.  Anger.  Pain.  Love. 

Kylo is crossing a frozen river on the back of his deer.  He sees the Imperial camp up ahead.  Asleep.  He can move in, slaughter their commanding officer and banish the cowards from Aetheria. 

But the ice cracks.  Kylo has just enough time to urge his deer forward, towards the bank, but it’s too late.  He plunges into icy water, gasping at the shock, before being swept under the ice with the fast current.  Kylo can hear his deer screaming as she breaks the ice flowing down the river.  Her legs kick out erratically.  He can’t breathe. 

Kylo tries to claw his way through the ice, but it’s no use.  Before he knows it, he and his deer are swept away, over a waterfall that marks the end of the plateaus of his home and the forests below.  Kylo’s last thoughts are of his children and if the Imperials will spare them.  They’re so young.  He closes his eyes.  He can’t watch himself fall to his death.

Hopefully the Great Mother will not punish him for his cowardice.

Kylo hits the rocks at the bottom of the waterfall and is swept away by the Force before the true blackness of death sets in.  More memories slip by.

A hand patting his cheek, calling him a good girl, then twisting his head to sink his teeth into the bastard’s hand.

Kylo lets these memories go by.  The consuming pain of hunger.  Weakness.  Shame at someone tossing him scraps of food, then relief at realizing they haven’t gone bad yet. 

Someone touching him gently.  Touching his face.  Holding him as he shakes in fear, in anger, in sorrow.  Singing to him a slow, sad song about a soldier coming home.

Feeling like he’s going to throw up as General Hux stares him down on the bridge, knowing his decision nearly destroyed the ship.

A boot on his antler forces Kylo’s head into the snow.  His leg is in agony.  There’s red slush everywhere around him.  The man, the Wolf, steps off of the antler.  Pulls him up.  Pets his face and says all is forgiven, little fawn.  Oh, to see the daughter of Great Aetheria obeying his commands and crying so sweetly into his kind hands that had just slapped his face. 

Kylo can’t take it anymore.  When the man lets go of his antler to paw at him further, he jerks his head to the side and wallops the man in the face with his antlers.  His First Order command cap is flung into the snow.  There are two bloody lines across his face.  And he’s angry.  He’s so, so angry.  And Kylo is crying again, tears freezing on his face, as the man pulls out his blaster and says, “That wasn’t a good idea, little fawn.  I’ll make sure you forget though.”  Kylo tries to back up, but his classmates encircle him, eyes burning with hatred.  “You won’t remember a thing.  I’m nice like that.  Won’t you thank me, fawn?  My snowflake?  For your rebirth?”

Kylo is shot with a stunner and falls to the cold, snowy ground.

The memories take off without his control again.

Kylo is huddled against the durasteel wall of a ship.  There’s a man crouched in front of him.  He has red hair.  Kylo knows this man.  He knows him but can’t stop from flinching any time he comes too close.

The memories start to slow down.  Condense.

The sun is hot against his skin.  The wind flows cold in opposition.  The leather strips of his armor tickle at his exposed legs.  So does the hair on his deer.

Next to him, Kylo sees the Arkani woman, a redhead atop the back of one of their great cats, the descendants of Taygeta.  She’s confident on the charging cat’s bare back.  Her short sword is unsheathed.  There’s a fierce grin to her face like reminds Kylo of the wolves that plague Aetheria.

No.  She is no wolf.  The wolves stand across the field.

Kylo looks across the field to see the Jedi have ignited their sabers.  Their clones have their blasters raised.  No one has fired.  They are letting Aetheria and Arkanis charge against them.  In their minds, at least they give the savages that.

Kylo’s heart pounds in his chest.  His spear is clutched in his hand, but it shakes. 

Across the field, there’s a forest.  In a direct diagonal from where Kylo and his deer charge.

He could veer off.  Vanish.

They would never find him again.

Kylo’s deer, T’Mika, snorts.  She’s heard his thoughts.

They’re all going to die anyway.  It’s stupid not to seek life.

Just as Kylo is about to veer his deer off course, something hums in his body. 

His eyes are brought to the leader of their charge.  She sits atop the back of Great Aetheria.  A kyber deer matriarch in her prime.  The rider is a Matriarch too.  The kyber antlers on their heads glitter in the sun. 

Kylo can just see the gold necklace on the Matriarch’s dark neck.  Something the Arkani had given her the night before. 

Two cat canines connected by an antler with many branches.

A symbol of Arkani and Aetherian unity.

The Matriarch, Great Aetheria, leads them both against the Republic invaders.

Kylo looks back, forward, at the vast Republic army that stands in their way. 

No.  He will not run.  He will charge these demons.  And he, along with all of Arkanis and Aetheria, will win.  For the Great Mother is on their side.  And the Great Mother would never let any of her children fall into the hands of her enemies. 

Kylo tightens a hand into the long fur at T’Mika’s neck.  She snorts in excitement at Kylo’s thoughts. 

Kylo holds his spear aloft.  “Great Aetheria!” he shouts over the din of thundering hooves. 

And behind him, next to him, he hears the answering call.

A grin splits Kylo’s face.

Kylo sees one clone’s weapon lift up.  As the blaster fires, Kylo holds up his hand to catch it.  It freezes in midair, crackling, before Kylo flings it away.

T’Mika bellows.  That’s all Kylo hears, echoing in his mind, as the two armies collide.  They shake the ground like an earthquake.  Kylo is almost thrown from T’Mika’s back. 

The Force shakes within his body. 

Around him, the landscape shifts out of focus.  The sun grows warmer on his skin.  The smell of blood is an afterthought.

Then, as Kylo lifts his spear to impale a clone warrior, he’s wrenched out of the battle by a rough hand.  There’s darkness all around him.  No light.  Nothing in this place in between places.

Then, there is something.

A white room.

Kylo sits against one corner of the room, panting.  He’s still wearing his dress uniform, though he’s lost the hat and his hair hangs loose around his face. 

The sequence of memories, with all their associated emotions, swirls in Kylo’s mind.  He tosses his head side to side to dislodge them. 

He hears someone whimper.  From across the room.

Kylo isn’t alone.

There’s someone curled against the corner of the white room.  Their face is pressed against the wall, so that their long black hair hides their identity. 

But the armor.

Kylo knows the armor.

One of Mitaka’s legs is stretched out.  The knife has been taken out, but the wound still bleeds sluggishly.  There’s a small patch of the viscous fluid pooled around his thigh.  It sticks tacky on the armor’s long, decorative leather strips. 

Mitaka whines again.  He lifts a hand to press against the wall.  It too is stained red from blood.  And the source: Mitaka’s fingertips.  Fingernails are missing from three of them.

“Hey,” Kylo says.  “Hey!  Can you hear me?”

Mitaka gives no sign that he’s heard Kylo.

So Kylo stands up.  He nearly has to crouch because the room is so small.  He reaches up to press against the ceiling.  It doesn’t budge.  He does the same with the walls.  But no.  They’re not moving.

So Kylo starts feeling the walls for a hidden lock.  Like a button built into the wall or a seam in the room. 

But no.  There’s no discernable way out.

Kylo’s heart beats faster.

He sits back down.

Kylo has been through something like this before.  With Snoke.  To make him stronger, Snoke trapped Kylo in a room like this one.  But the room wasn’t real then.  It was only within his mind. 

Kylo knows Snoke can’t be the one who contains them now.

But who does?

It doesn’t matter.  All that matters is that Kylo has to get out.

So Kylo does what he did then with Snoke.  He sits cross-legged and meditates on the Force.  Kylo feels it curl warmly in his stomach, like a cat on his lap, but that’s all it does.  When Kylo tries to blast his way out, tear down the walls, nothing happens.  The Force exists, but it won’t act.

So Kylo tries again.  Nothing.

“What the hell?” Kylo growls.  “Why won’t you _work_?”

He opens his eyes to see the white room.

“What do you want from me?” Kylo asks.  “Why did you bring me here?”

The Force departs from him, leaving him cold.

Another small whimper from Mitaka.

The irritation in Kylo snaps.  “Well, what do _you_ want?”

That gets Mitaka’s attention.  He flinches and presses himself closer to the corner.

Kylo is reminded of a dog he once saw chained up to a post on a forgettable planet during a mission.  Its master had hit it with a crop for whimpering too loudly at the pain from its maggot infested leg.

But that dog had led him to his mission.  For without its whimpering, Kylo would have walked right past the old man.  The old, Force sensitive man.  An ex-Jedi. 

In thanks, Kylo had carried the dog into town and given it to a local healer.  The healer woman asked no questions about why he had the ex-Jedi’s dog, even though it was a small, small town.

Perhaps the answer to escaping lies with Kylo’s companion here.  Just like it did with the dog.  They both whimper, after all.

Kylo thinks back to the trauma books he read in the libraries on Chandrila.  Thinks back to any information he gathered from Rebel and Imperial veterans. 

“Hey,” Kylo says in the gentlest tone he can muster.  “It’s all right.  You’re all right.”

At no response from Mitaka, Kylo inches closer.  When he gets to the halfway point, Mitaka suddenly tenses.

Good.  So he knows Kylo’s there.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” Kylo says.  “Not like they did.”

“How do you know that?” Mitaka asks.  He doesn’t look at Kylo.  “Were you there?  Watching?”

Kylo shakes his head.  “No.  I wasn’t watching.”

Mitaka laughs against the wall.  Then, he pushes himself off of it and turns to Kylo.

What Kylo sees makes him jerk backwards.

The antlers that adorn Mitaka’s head in the room on Canto Bight.  They’re gone.  Sawed off, right at the base, so two small, uneven stumps remain.  Mitaka’s left eye is near swollen shut from bruising.  The other eye is bright red.  Burst capillaries.  There are three circular burn marks running up his right cheek bone.  Like from cigarettes.  Mitaka’s lip is split.  Probably from the same impact that bruised his eye.  But maybe not.  Kylo wouldn’t know.

Snoke tortured Kylo in a much more refined way.  Electric shocks.  Or assaults on his mind using the Force.  Nothing that made Kylo incapable of fighting.

“Oh.”  It’s all Kylo can say.

Kylo has seen his fair share of injuries, but it’s different when they’re staring at you with such accusatory hatred.  His enemies always shook in his presence, and when Kylo struck them down with the Force, their deaths came quickly. 

“Were you there?” Mitaka asks again.  His voice is hoarse.

Kylo shakes his head.  “No.  No.  I wasn’t.”

Mitaka acts like he didn’t hear him.  “Were you there when they held me down and sawed through my antlers?  The antlers of my foremothers?  Did you laugh with them?”

“I didn’t,” Kylo says.  He feels even more trapped by the room now.  “I didn’t.”

“Don’t _lie_ ,” Mitaka says, voice cracking.  “Don’t _lie_ to me.  I know you were there.  I know you had your hands around my throat and were laughing as I tried to breathe!”  Mitaka’s face breaks but swings back to accusatory hatred in a split second.  “You left me here to die!  To be reborn for these wolves!  Don’t _lie_!”

A strong humming shakes the room Kylo and Mitaka are trapped in.  Kylo feels a strong wind blowing.  It rustles his hair, rustles Mitaka’s hair, makes the strips of leather not tacky with blood flail in the air.

Kylo feels the Force pulse in him once, then vanish. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Kylo shouts.  He’s panicking now.  Snoke rarely took the Force away from him.  Never like this.

The winds blow harder.  The vibrations shaking the room grow. 

Kylo realizes he can’t lift his arms.  Can’t lift his legs.

Kylo can’t stay here.  The room must have a breaking point.  He has to leave.

“Mitaka, I need you to listen to me.”

But Mitaka is lost again to the haze of his pain.  He shouts at Kylo in that strange, lyrical language all of his pain, his misery, his fear and anguish, the culmination of what Kylo has felt in this strange place between the galaxy and the limitless Force.

Kylo thinks back to Hux.  “Lieutenant!” he shouts.

But that has no effect except to bring Mitaka’s wrath back to Kylo.  Kylo tries to summon the Force, but he has no power here, trapped in a prison of Mitaka’s own memories.

Mitaka draws something from the emptiness of his hip sheaths.  It’s one of the kyber knives, summoned from nothingness.  The kyber blade is deadly sharp and pointed right at Kylo.  Mitaka pushes himself to kneel, clenching his teeth as his thigh starts to bleed again, and pulls himself towards Kylo with one hand on the ground, one holding the knife.

Kylo pushes himself back against the wall with great effort.  There’s nowhere else left to go.  “Mitaka, listen to me.  This is a dream.  This isn’t real.  You got out.  You got away from them.  From him.  I’m not here to hurt you.”

But Mitaka isn’t listening.  “And the Great Mother did approach the Wolf and said unto the snarling beast.  ‘You ran.  But I found you.  You can never hide from me.’”

Kylo tries another tactic.  “Dopheld.  Dopheld, I’m Kylo Ren.  I’m working with Armitage Hux.  I need to get back to him.  And you to Cassini Parnew, right?  And we can only do that if you help me.  If you drop the knife.”

“ _Matria, puer fava mira mei._ ”

Kylo tracks the knife.  He’s never felt so powerless. 

He desperately thinks back to those trauma books.

Something personal.  Something to break the survivor out of their trance. 

Kylo has tried everything. 

No, not everything. 

Kylo looks back at the sawed off antlers protruding from Mitaka’s forehead.

Hux called Mitaka something.  Kylo knows because Mitaka reacted to it like it was a name. 

Kylo slouches against the wall.  Mitaka straddles him now.  The knife tucks under his chin.  Kylo feels the point against the delicate skin of his throat and the words burst out of him.

“Emahim,” Kylo says.  He’s shaking.  “Emahim.”

Mitaka stops with the dagger curve pressed against Kylo’s neck. 

The Force flows back into Kylo just as the room starts to shake apart.  One wall falls and reveals billions of burning stars.  Nebula.  Great clouds of galactic gas. 

A great power fills Kylo’s body.  It was trapped by the four white walls before, but with one wall gone, not anymore.   But it’s burning Kylo’s body up.  He can feel the heat of it.  Burning like the kyber deer running through the forest, on fire and dying.

Before Mitaka can trap him again, Kylo lifts a hand to his face.  He pushes himself through Mitaka’s meager defenses, ignoring his scream, before pulling the two of them out of the white room, away from the pull of the whole Force.  Kylo just manages to hold onto Mitaka’s squirming mind before a more powerful force than his own separates them. 

Kylo blinks back to the room on Canto Bight just in time to see Mitaka jerk himself away from his kyber knives and across the room.  Far away from Amora, who still sits there with her face turned to the ceiling.

Mitaka breathes hard, almost hyperventilates. 

Next to Kylo, Hux is half out of his seat, going towards Mitaka.

Mitaka’s eyes are unfocused.  With a whimper, he paws at his antlers.  His relief is masked by his face crumbling in sorrow as he hunches over himself.

There are tears running down Amora’s face, though they aren’t caused by sadness.  They’re caused by joy.

Kylo hears Hux draw a shuddering breath.

“I never thought,” Amora says.  “I never realized.  Dalla…the Last of the Great Aetherians…to finally know you.  And your fellow riders.”

Mitaka still shakes where he sits hunched over himself.  He lets Parnew take his hand away from one antler but makes no acknowledgement to it either.  Parnew whispers something into her wrist.  Whatever emotions she feels are tucked far away. 

Amora finally looks down at Hux.  “Come with me,” she says, still tearful.  She holds out a hand.  “Come with me, Arkani!  Let’s discuss your engine.”

Hux hesitates for a second.  He takes one last look at his lieutenants.  Then, with a forced smile, he takes Amora’s hand and lets her pull him up.  “I thank you, Lady Cohn.”

But Amora shakes her head.  “No.  Thank the Great Mother for bringing all of us together.”  She places her hand on his cheek.  “Let’s talk over brandy, hmm?”

Hux agrees and lets himself be pulled out of the room.  Kylo tries to look at him, to see what he truly feels, but Hux keeps his head ducked low. 

Out of shame?

Yes.  For Kylo dips quickly into Hux’s head and feels nothing but that.

Shame.

For making his lieutenant feel this way again when he promised him he would never hurt him like _he_ did.  Never.


	7. The Home of the Goddess

Cecylia Forstner arrives minutes later.

Kylo leaves once she arrives.  Whatever these lieutenants have with each other Kylo doesn’t.  He doesn’t want to intrude.  Even though similar thoughts must swirl in Kylo and Mitaka’s minds.

Though, being Mitaka’s memories and the memories of his family, Kylo understands them having a greater impact on him.

The Force did its best to make Kylo feel them too.  Anxiety still twitches under his skin, prompts him to keep out of sight and to the shadows.  Another feeling demands he gorge himself on these Canto Bight delicacies, for when will he get to eat next?

Kylo ignores these intrusive thoughts as he makes his way across the Canto Bight casino floors and away from the people who bathe in excess and indulgence.

The Force is leading him somewhere.

Kylo is happy to follow it. 

The Force takes him to the artificial beach of the artificial ocean on the desert planet of Canto Bight.  Sea air whips at Kylo’s face.  He takes off his command cap and tucks it under his belt.  Then, he unbraids his hair and lets it flow in the breeze.  Kylo takes off his gloves too. 

Then, following some emotion within him, Kylo sits in the sand and stares out at the ocean.  He doesn’t realize his hands are shaking until he tries to pick up a sea shell next to him.

“Shit,” Kylo mutters.

The cold sea air whips at him.  Though he knows that isn’t the source of his shivering.

Kylo looks into himself and reexamines his Force barrier.  The one that keeps he and Snoke separated, when necessary.  Snoke had actually been the one to suggest the idea.  It happened after Kylo fell into enemy’s hands, those who knew how to deal with a Force sensitive and set a bor gullet on his mind.  Though no harm came to his body, Kylo’s mind was near shredded.

When he limped back to Snoke, his master only told him that a boundary must be built between them.  Snoke had participated in the mind torture too.  Kylo had apologized to his master, for being captured and subjecting him to such torment.

Thankfully, the barrier is still there.  So Kylo won’t be punished for his next thoughts.

Snoke was wrong.  The Force didn’t lead him here because of Hux.  

It led Kylo here for himself. 

What Kylo saw in those kyber knives, what he felt…

Kylo’s head starts pounding.  With a moan, he lies down in the sand and curls into himself. 

A memory rises to the surface.  One that doesn’t belong to him. 

Walking on the beaches of Aetheria.  His deer next to him.  She has just begun to grow her kyber antlers.  Turning into a real Matriarch.

“Soon, I will be one too,” Kylo says to T’Mika. 

T’Mika snorts.  Then tosses her head.

Kylo laughs.  “Yes, growing pains, growing pains.  I’m glad I only have to wear them.”

Kylo fades back to Casino Bight.  Above him, on a balcony, people laugh.  Kylo turns to look.  They point at the ocean in front of him.

So Kylo looks.  He just sees the tail of what has to be a whale diving.  The splash is near silent from the noise of the casino. 

“Drawn to the ocean too?” a voice behind Kylo asks.

Kylo jerks to sit up and turn around.  The Force is in his fingertips.  He’s ready to strike at whoever just snuck up on him.

But it’s someone Kylo knows.

It’s Mitaka.

Mitaka gestures to the sand next to Kylo.  “May I sit?” he asks.

Kylo thinks it disconcerting to hear Mitaka’s normal soft tone, when he just heard him snarling for Kylo’s death less than an hour ago. 

But Kylo nods before turning back to the ocean.

Mitaka sits down next to him.  Kylo notices how small he really is, when compared to himself.  Mitaka even makes himself smaller by drawing one leg close, but leaving the other, scarred one stretched out towards the surf.

Kylo sees one kyber knife glittering at Mitaka’s hip.  He hasn’t unsheathed it or the other; they just sit there exposed. 

Mitaka sees Kylo looking.  “Don’t worry,” he says.  “I’m not here to kill you.”

“You say that like you’ve said it before.”

“Hmmm.”

Salty sea air stings at Kylo’s eyes.  At his nose. 

“What did I see?” Kylo asks. 

The waves crash against the shore.  Again and again before Mitaka speaks.

“My family.  Myself.”

“Why?”

Mitaka shrugs.  “The antlers must have pulled you in.  For some reason or another.  But I don’t know why.”

“Shouldn’t you?”

“There are things only a Matriarch may know.”

“Not an Emahim?”

Mitaka hums.  “Very good.  No, not yet.  Perhaps I’ll know one day.  My aunt is first.  She is the Ematrim of my clan.  The next in line.”

There’s silence for a great deal.  Only interrupted by laughing casino guests and the crashing waves of the ocean.

“I have to let you know,” Mitaka says.  “The link went both ways.”

Kylo feels a sinking sense of dread in his stomach.  “Oh?”

“What you have…with the Supreme Leader…”

“Is nothing like him.”

“Snoke was with you from birth,” Mitaka says.  “At least mine was only there for a year or two.”

Kylo glares at him.  “It’s not the same.”

Mitaka visibly flinches before looking away.  His hands grip his leather strips tightly.

Kylo sighs.  “Don’t,” he says.  “No need for that.  I won’t hurt you.”

“He said that too.”

Kylo scowls.  “Yeah, well I mean it.”

Mitaka blinks in surprise at Kylo before he relaxes.  He takes out one kyber knife and starts drawing in the sand. 

It’s not like that with Snoke.  Snoke makes Kylo stronger.  That’s it.  No pain, no benefit.  There must be an equal and opposite reaction for every action.

It’s not just senseless pain. 

Kylo wonders where this protective instinct is coming from.  Probably something in the exchange.  Kylo wouldn’t doubt if Mitaka started destroying the beach right now.  It sounds like something Kylo would do after so much personal information was revealed.

Kylo tries to focus on the beach, but the sound of sand scraping against kyber is near unbearable.  “Shouldn’t you treat kyber a bit nicer?” Kylo asks.  He thinks back to the kyber from his old lightsaber.  How he respected that crystal. 

Mitaka only shrugs.  “T’Mika loved sandy beaches.  My Matriarch would often walk with her there.”

“Yeah,” Kylo says, thinking back on the memory.  Of patting a sandy flank and mounting his deer with regret because they both loved the beach and didn’t want to leave.  “I know.” 

With Mitaka looking down, Kylo can see his antlers more clearly.  They look rough.  Chipped in some places.  One prong tip is stained red.  Kylo knows it’s blood. 

And at the base of an antler, there’s a thin white line wrapping all around it.

“You got the antlers back,” Kylo says, surprised.

Mitaka nods.  “I did.  He was using them as paperweights.”

“Is he dead?”

Mitaka’s mouth tightens.  He stops drawing in the sand.  “No.  He escaped.  No one has heard from him in three years.”

Kylo senses Mitaka doesn’t want to talk about that anymore.  He instead looks down at what Mitaka is drawing.  “What is that?”

“This,” Mitaka says.  “Would get be reconditioned if found on any First Order property.”

It’s a strange shape.  A flower surrounded by tree branches.  No, not branches.  Like Amora’s necklace, they’re antlers. 

And then it hits Kylo.  Arkanis and Aetheria.  United again.

“Arkanis and Aetheria have such a tragic past,” Mitaka says sadly.  “Arkanis fell to the Imperials because Aetheria hated their faith.  Aetheria fell to the crime syndicate Drex Atasi because the clans wouldn’t unite.  Hatred over whether kyber deer or kyber antelope were the manifestations of the Great Mother.”  He scoffs.  “Ridiculous.”

“I don’t understand,” Kylo says.  These First Order officers.  So damn vague.  “Everyone has been speaking to me in riddles all damn night.  Hux, Parnew, now you.  I want a real explanation.  A real answer.  What are you talking about?”

“I just gave you it,” Mitaka says.  “Reconditioning.”

Kylo doesn’t understand at first.

But then he does.  Somehow, Kylo remembers.  Through Mitaka’s memories that still swim in his mind.  Leftover from the transfer.

_“You left me here to die!  To be reborn for these wolves!  Don’t lie!”_

Dread fills Kylo’s stomach.

“Tell me,” he says to Mitaka.  “If I’m wrong to be afraid.”

So Mitaka tells him a story.  About a little known Imperial commandant named Brendol Hux who started a program at the Arkani Academy to better train stormtrooper soldiers.  About how, when Arkanis fell and the Imperials fled, Brendol fled too, taking his son and his program with him.  How that program was noticed by the First Order High Command, which soon mass-produced the systems required for troop programming. 

Effectiveness increased.  The First Order expanded.  It was unstoppable.  The planets of the Unknown Regions fell quickly to the better trained, better programmed First Order stormtroopers. 

No one who had been through the program faltered.  They were perfect soldiers.  Those who died were meant to die.  Just because a program was perfect didn’t mean that no soldier will ever die.

But then.  There were questions.  Stormtroopers coming back from destroying villages and slaughtering civilians and wondering why.  At first, execution was used to prevent these traitorous thoughts.  The expense, though, proved to be too high.  High Command needed a better solution. 

It’s unknown who first proposed ‘reconditioning’, the reprogramming of stormtroopers, in times of questioning.  Some say it was Hux.  Mitaka says he doesn’t believe that, given Hux’s own Arkani background.  Kylo decides to trust his judgment.  He had been inside his head, after all.

But it did make sense that stormtroopers would be the first to be reconditioned; they saw more of the galaxy than the naval officers aboard the Star Destroyers.  They absorbed more information.  That led to questioning. 

But information reaches the navy too. 

So reconditioning became the threat the First Order lived under.  No one was safe.  Not even the people who started the program.  Anyone from junior officers to the most senior officers of High Command could be subjected to reconditioning.  It only took credible accusations for you to be chosen.

Mitaka shakes his head.  “So many times, someone in the officer corps or stormtroopers will just vanish.  After saying something they shouldn’t have.  Doing something they shouldn’t have.  But they’ll always pop back up on another ship with a new name and a new love for the First Order.”

A deep fear sits in Kylo’s stomach.  It’s residual, yes, left over from the emotional contact he had with Mitaka, but it belongs to Kylo too.

So much of Hux’s behavior.  Explained, with one word.

“But it’d destroy you,” Kylo says quietly.

“Yes,” Mitaka says.  “It would.  But what’s necessary remains.  My fighting skills?  My knowledge of computers?  That would remain.  But everything else would be gone forever.  You’d be lost.  Dead.  But your body would walk.”  Mitaka looks back to the ocean.  “And they’d make you do whatever they wanted.”

“That’s what you meant,” Kylo says.  “In the White Room.”

It’s the first time Kylo brings it up specifically.  It makes Mitaka’s breathing hitch. 

“If Hux had come five minutes later, I would be gone,” Mitaka says.  “My family would have lost another child.  The line of Matriarch would pass from my Aunt Niabi and then to Mirava, who has never wanted it.  My mother’s last tie to Aetheria would be gone.”  He curls into himself.  “But I _wouldn’t_ be gone.  I would walk the galaxy.  I would have the same voice, the same eyes, the same everything.  But they could order me to kill my family, and I would do it.”  Mitaka looks at Kylo.  His eyes are shiny.  “And there’s nothing I could have done.  My fate was sealed when I wouldn’t kill that girl.”

“Because you disobeyed?”

“Because I was a defect in their program,” Mitaka says.  His voice is louder now.  Angrier.  From that rage he keeps tucked away inside himself.  Kylo knows because he felt it himself.  Feels it himself.  “Because I questioned my superiors instead of following my orders.  That’s why they wanted to _destroy_ me.”

“But Hux came.”

Mitaka nods.  Exhales sharply.  “He did.  He saved my life.  That planet we were on?  It’s called Cirova.  That’s why I let Cohn see my great-grandmother’s charge.  I owed him my life.  So I owed a favor worth that.”  Mitaka inhales deeply.  Exhales shakily.  “As I owe you one too.”

Kylo doesn’t answer Mitaka.  He doesn’t even really hear him.  His mind still fixates on the horrors of reconditioning.

They could do that to Hux.

“How can I keep him safe?” Kylo asks.

Mitaka shrugs.  “I don’t know.”

“Bullshit,” Kylo says, angry.  “I felt it.  You think about it constantly.  But it’s not just about Cirovva.  It’s about other people too.”

“You’re right,” Mitaka says.  “I _do_ think about it constantly.  I have two younger sisters.  I’m the eldest, so I have to protect them.”  He looks out to the ocean.  “And Cassini.  I…care for her.”

“Then what do you do?”

Mitaka laughs bitterly.  “That’s the fun part.  You really can’t do anything.  You’re one person against an entire system that’s waiting for you to fall.”

Kylo shakes his head.  “I’m not just one person,” he says.  “I’m Master of the Knights of Ren.  I can keep Hux safe.  And I will.”

“And I’m Emahim of the Plateaus of Aetheria,” Mitaka says sarcastically.  “Do you think a title will keep Cassini from disappearing in the middle of the night, just because she wants to learn how to defend herself?” 

“The Force will protect me.”

“And what if She isn’t there?” Mitaka asks.  “What if Snoke, Force sensitive too, decides that Hux’s Arkani history needs to be erased?  His personality?  They can keep his bloodthirst.  His ferocity.  There’s nothing you can do except watch what you say and do whenever an Imperial is sniffing around.”

Kylo shakes his head.  “I don’t believe that.”

“Then you’re in denial.”

“No,” he says.  “There’s something I can do.”  Kylo looks to Mitaka, who now scowls at the sand.  “I saw something.  In your mind.  Through the antlers.  Your…Matriarch…charging into battle.”

“The Battle Charge of the Two Sisters, yes,” Mitaka says.

“I didn’t see just that.”

“I know,” Mitaka says.

“I saw two other women.  The painting’s wrong.”

Mitaka sneers.  “That horrible thing?  An awful representation of my Matriarch’s relationship with T’Mika.  And yes, it excludes two women who were more important in that battle than my great-grandmother.”

“But I’m not just talking about the other women,” Kylo says.  “Dalla, your Matriarch…she did something…something I’ve never seen before.”

Kylo flashes back to what he saw.  A clone firing his blaster.  And Dalla lifting her hand and freezing the bolt in midair before flinging it away.

She’s Force sensitive.  Not just spiritual in the Force like her great-grandchild.  But truly Force sensitive.

Mitaka sighs.  “Just ask.”

“I want to learn what Dalla knows,” Kylo says.  There’s a rush in his body.  It makes his hands dig into the hard-packed sand and tear it apart.  “To stop blaster bolts and fling my enemies away from me.”  He looks at Mitaka’s kyber daggers.  He thinks back to the sparring he saw between Mitaka and Parnew on the ship.  “And I want to learn how to fight.  For real.  Snoke won’t teach me until I’ve mastered the Force.  I know so little.  And to be a Knight…I have to know how to fight.  With a lightsaber.”

“Aetherians don’t use lightsabers.”

“Isn’t a spear close enough?” Kylo asks.

“And that is your choice?”  Mitaka asks, still looking out at the ocean.  “That I bring you to my Matriarch so she might teach you our Aetherian ways?”

Kylo nods.  “Yes.”

“Then I’ll ask you the same question I asked Cohn and Cassini.”  Mitaka meets Kylo in the eyes.  It’s the first time he’s made eye contact for this long.  Kylo almost wants to look away but holds steady.  “Why do you want to learn?”

Kylo thinks back all the way to last night’s dinner.  Hux’s nervousness as he cooked.  Gently rebuking Kylo for questioning the Supreme Leader.  Avoiding the details of the mission.  Hiding from Kylo.  Out of fear.  Lying to Amora Cohn that he knew nothing about the Arkani flower language, even though he does.  Feeling guilt for hurting his lieutenants, who he only wants to protect.

Kylo answers Mitaka’s question easily enough.

“Because I need to protect Hux,” Kylo says.  “And keep him safe from the fear you felt in the White Room.  I never want him to feel that.  Never.”

Mitaka stares at Kylo for a long time.  He doesn’t blink.

Then, Mitaka stands up.  The leather strips of his uniform fall around him, barring the one piece shorn off at the thigh by a little girl he was ordered to kill.  “Then I will take you to my Matriarch, Dalla, the Last of the Great Aetherians, and you will face the judgement of our clan.  If you pass, we will teach you what we know.”

Kylo thinks he should respond in an equally dramatic fashion, but a question hangs at the back of his mind.  One that’s been there for a while.  “What are the leather strips all about?”  He waves a hand at Mitaka’s legs.

Mitaka wasn’t expecting that.  He tilts his head in a question, then looks down and grabs one in hand.  “These?  They’re for distraction,” he says.  He looks back up at Kylo.  “Intimidation.”  Then, Mitaka unsheathes both daggers.  “When you move, they move with you.  Your enemy follows the strips rather than you.”  He sways his body.  The strips move as intended.

Then, Mitaka eyes the beach.  “And then, if you have a spear or even a lightsaber, you may even do this.”  He holds his daggers like a spear, steps forward and turns around himself, spinning his ‘spear’ above his head as he does so.  The leather strips flare out dramatically.  Kylo has to admit they’re distracting.  And thus useful.

“Can I ask another question?” Kylo asks.  “About Hux this time?”

Mitaka smiles.  “I can’t promise to answer it.”

“Hux cooked for me last night,” Kylo says.  He doesn’t bring up pissing Hux off with his careless comments of cooking teeth.  “He’s been cooking for me for weeks now.  Does that mean anything?”

Mitaka’s eyes widen.  Just as he opens his mouth to answer, they both hear someone step onto the steps leading to the beach with a creak to the ancient wood.

It’s Hux. 

And behind him, another figure.  One that has to be Cassini Parnew, judging by the faint excitement that lights up unprovoked in Kylo’s brain. 

Mitaka glances back at Kylo with a small smile on his face.  “How about you ask him yourself?”  He watches as Hux and Parnew talk before glancing back at the ocean.  “The tides are changing,” he says to Kylo, still sitting on the beach.  The curve of his antlers look gold in the Canto Bight light.  The bruising shines on his face.  “I’ll let you know when it’s time to go to the Matriarch.”  He stares up at the stars.  Kylo feels a phantom yearning tight in his chest.  He feels the sudden urge to cry.  “Until then, may the Great Mother walk with us.  Always.”

Kylo laughs at the bastardization of a Jedi saying.  He voices that to Mitaka.

Mitaka laughs too.  “Actually, we had it first,” he says.  Then, before Kylo can question him further, he’s gone, walking up the beach as Hux and Cassini walk down the stairs.  Mitaka stops when he gets to Hux.  They talk briefly.  They’re too far away for Kylo to tell what they’re talking about, nor their expressions, but he sees Hux lift a hand to pet at the prong of one of Mitaka’s antlers.

So.  No resentment there.

Mitaka heads back up the stairs to meet Cassini Parnew.  Kylo sees him bump an antler against her head before she takes his hand and pulls him down the stretch of beach.  She lifts a hand to point at the stars.  They easily disappear into the darkness gifted by the cliff sides.

Hux sits next to Kylo like Mitaka did.

The waves lap at the shore.  When they break, Kylo feels the Force rush over him.  It settles his residual nervousness left over from his experience with Mitaka. 

Hux takes his hand.  Kylo wraps his fingers around him. 

“I got my political support,” Hux says.  “The deal is finalized.  And she knows more people than I thought.  I doubt I’ll have to do something like this again.  Only continue to please the people Amora knows.”

“That’s very good.”

Hux rubs a thumb over Kylo’s hand.  “I’m sorry.”

Kylo blinks at that.  “For what?”

“For not telling you.  About Arkanis.”

Kylo thinks back to the White Room.  Of Mitaka so desperate to get out he’d claw at the walls with bloodied fingers.  Even after the nails had been torn out.

“Don’t apologize,” Kylo says, voice shuddering.  “Don’t.  Please.  I didn’t understand.”

“I guess I know what you and Mitaka saw then,” Hux says matter-of-factly.  Like reconditioning was something else besides the killing of your soul.  “When you both closed your eyes and got pulled into the kyber knives.”

“I do know,” Kylo says.  He twists to look at Hux.  “And Hux…I’m—” Kylo lifts his other hand to cup Hux’s face.  “I’m so sorry, Hux.  For pushing you like that.  For making you scared like that.”

Hux laughs at that.  “I wasn’t scared.”

“Hux.  The Force.  She always lets me know.”

Confused, Kylo shakes his head.  She?  The Force is an energy.  Without gender.

Hux laughs at that too.  “I see you and Mitaka were also talking about _other_ things.”

Kylo senses Hux wants a change in conversation.  And he’ll indulge Hux.  He will.  Kylo never wants to be someone who makes Hux afraid for his soul.  “Yes.  He elaborated more on the Great Mother.  Though not by much.”

“He’s very secretive,” Hux says.  “It takes a lot to get him to even talk sometimes.”  Hux looks back at the ocean.  “It does with me, too.”

Kylo lets Hux stare at the ocean in silence.  He notices Hux breathes with the crashing of the waves on shore.  Inhale with the curve of water.  Exhale with the breakage. 

“You asked me earlier to talk about the flower language of Arkanis,” Hux says.

Kylo shakes his head.  “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.  I don’t want to push you.”  _I don’t want you to get hurt._

Hux looks at Kylo sharply.  “Kylo.  I…trust you to keep this between us.  And only us.”  Hux’s sharp look gives way to something softer.  “Please let me tell you.  It’s been so long since I got to talk about this with anyone.”

Kylo, still nervous, nods.  He pets at Hux’s face, then looks up at the circlet atop Hux’s head.

Hux lets go of Kylo’s hands to grab the circlet with both hands.  He tilts the crown into the light spilling onto the beach from Canto Bight.  “Amora was correct in identifying these flowers as azaleas, aubrietas and marigolds.  However, she was incorrect in their meaning.”  Hux points at one flower.  “This is an azalea.  They call for ‘pain’ or ‘suffering’.  You don’t want to receive these in your bouquet.”  He points to another.  “This is an aubrieta.  They call for ‘death’.  Again, not very welcoming.”  Finally, Hux points at the smallest flowers on the circlet.  They all congregate on the front of the circlet, right between Hux’s eyes.  “And these are marigolds.  They do stand for love, but for love of Taygeta, the strongest of the seven sisters.”  Hux laughs to himself.  “At least, the strongest in my mother’s opinion.”

“That’s very different than what Amora identified,” Kylo says.

Hux rolls his eyes.  “Well, what can you expect from outsiders.  The flower language is complicated.  Especially for those who don’t see.”  Then, Hux sighs.  “My mother wore this circlet often when she attended to Brendol.  He thought it meant love, too, but no.  She was just calling for his painful death with every visit.”  Hux looks back to the ocean.  “I guess she was right.  He did die painfully.  At least I gave her that.”

Even among such violent thoughts, Kylo detects a hint of longing.  “I’m sorry she was taken from you.”

Hux shrugs, tries to brush it off, but Kylo knows he’s hit true.  “I can still feel her sometimes.  When I’m doing certain things.”

“Like what?”

Hux takes off his gloves and reaches forward to dip his hand into the oncoming tide.  “When I’m by the ocean.  Taygeta is strongest here.”  Hux takes a deep breath.  “And when I cook.”

“I understand the ocean,” Kylo says.  “But why cooking?”

“She was a kitchen woman on Arkanis, Ren,” Hux says quietly.

Kylo is reminded of his conversation with Mitaka.

_He’s been cooking for me for weeks now.  Does that mean anything?_

_How about you ask him yourself?_

In true Imperial fashion, Hux has been revealing himself to Kylo in hints he didn’t even realize he was looking at.

Now, Kylo sees.  He wishes he had seen all along.

Hux at ease in the kitchen, his mother’s domain.  His companionship with Millicent, a representation of the great cats of Arkanis.  The flowers on his kitchen room table, made to fit in that tiny regulation kitchen.  Surely those vases mean something different every time Kylo sees a new arrangement.

Kylo scoots up to sit behind Hux, so that his legs extend on either side of him.  Then, Kylo leans forward and wraps his arms around him.  Hux leans back into the contact.

Many things have been revealed to Kylo this night.  Hux and Arkanis.  Mitaka and Aetheria.  The White Room and the promise that Mitaka would take Kylo to face Dalla, the Last of the Great Aetherians, one who led her people in resistance. 

And the fear that all the First Order lives under. 

“I’ll keep you safe from reconditioning,” Kylo says into Hux’s hair.  “You’ll never experience the fear I felt.  The fear I saw.”

“So you saw the White Room,” Hux says.

“I saw it,” Kylo says.  “I felt it.”

“Then you know there’s nothing we can do except hope we aren’t noticed.”

Kylo shakes his head.  He wants to tell Hux that Mitaka agreed to take him to his Matriarch for training.  That he too will master their weapons and stop blaster bolts in their tracks.  That he’ll take advantage of every opportunity to get stronger.  To protect Hux.

But the Force swirls in his mind at this thought.  A warning. 

Kylo is going against Snoke’s orders now.  He’s not observing anymore; he’s participating.  So it would be dangerous to share this news with Hux.  He doesn’t want Snoke to target him.  Kylo may not be irreplaceable, but Hux…Hux is just a gear to Snoke.  He’s not what he is to Kylo.

So Kylo keeps this information from Hux like he’ll keep it from Snoke.

But he can still give Hux comfort.  He’ll just have to voice it carefully.

“Snoke told me the Force smiled down on this meeting,” Kylo says.  “And I believe that’s the case for you.”  _And for me._ “Snoke somehow sensed your success with Amora.  He knew you’d get the support for your engines.  The Force is with you, Hux.  Protecting you.”  _As am I._

Hux leans into Kylo’s arm.  He feels his lips quirk into a smile.  “Perhaps you’re right,” Hux says.  “While Amora and I were talking, she suggested something very interesting.  A new application of the solar-hyperdrive engines.  One that I hadn’t even thought about.”

“See?  A revelation from the Force.”

“A revelation or maybe just a complete fucking oversight from yours truly.”

Kylo rolls his eyes but lets Hux pout. 

The waves continue to crash on shore.  From behind them, Canto Bight echoes with its indulgence.  Kylo looks around for Mitaka and Parnew, but they’ve disappeared.  Kylo spares a thought to wish Mitaka good luck.  In his head, he’d felt his affection for Cassini Parnew.  And he knows Parnew’s affection is there, too.

Hux twists to lie his head upon Kylo’s shoulder.  He breathes into his neck.  It tickles.  It reminds Kylo of Millicent’s whiskers tickling into his neck in Hux’s quarters.  So long ago.

“I might fall asleep like this,” Hux mumbles.

Thinking of Millicent brings Kylo back to _The Rise of Great Aetheria._ The inaccuracies there.  The missing two women. 

One was the Matriarch, who led the charge, not Dalla.  One was Dalla, atop the back of T’Mika.

But the third woman…

She rode atop the back of an Arkani cat. Her hair was a fiery red.  Her fierce expression was familiar to Kylo.  Like he’d seen it over and over again, staring back at him.

Something suddenly clicks into Kylo’s mind.

“I saw something else,” Kylo says, staring out at the ocean.  There’s a deep fear in his stomach, heavy like a boulder.  It’s nothing he’s ever felt before.  “In the charge against the Republic.”

Hux snuggles deeper into Kylo’s neck.  “Oh?”

“There was a woman.  Riding a cat.  She wielded a short sword.”  Kylo presses his nose into Hux’s hair.  “And she had bright red hair.”

Hux is quiet for a long time.  “The cat you saw has a name,” he slurs against Kylo’s skin.  Hux is near asleep.  “She was called Arma.  It means ‘fierce’ in Arkani.  And…and ‘Tidge’ means ‘little one’.”

Kylo’s eyes widen. 

_Arma Tidge_

_Arma-tidge_

_Armitage_

Hux’s breathing evens out.  Slumped against Kylo in the sand.  Surrounded by the ocean, the home of the goddess his family once worshipped, Hux falls asleep.

Kylo will keep him safe as he sleeps.  And even when he’s awake. 

He will.  That’s his goal, now.  Kylo’s afraid, but that fear will guide him to success.  To one day having Hux live with no fear of reconditioning, no fear that he’ll be taken away and lose all that remains of his mother and his home.

Kylo presses a kiss to Hux’s temple.  Holds it there.  Somehow, Hux smells like fresh flowers.  Like the flowers on his circlet came to life. 

Kylo sends a prayer to the Force, to the Great Mother, to Taygeta, to whoever’s listening.

_Please._

_Keep him safe._

_He’s all I have._

_He’s all I would ever want._

The ocean waves break and crash against the shore.

Kylo knows the Force has answered him.

* * *

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, wasn't that a wild ride? :D
> 
> Before I discuss spoilers, here are the tags, elaborated on:
> 
> The trauma deals with Mitaka's experience as an assassin in the First Order. There's reference to beating and abusive behavior from 'The Wolf', the man who trained Mitaka. There's also descriptions of injury to Mitaka. Snoke's electrocution punishment for Kylo is also discussed in this fic. 
> 
> There's also threat to a child's life in this fic.
> 
> Reconditioning is also discussed in this fic. This topic is frightening to me, so I recommend reading carefully. 
> 
> The misgendering occurs twice and is verbal and may be uncomfortable to those with dysphoria. But it makes you hate Amora Cohn just a bit more though, doesn't it?
> 
> The character death is Mitaka's grandmother. The circumstances behind her death are discussed heavily as well as a description of her dead body. Read with caution, please.
> 
> And now: for the end of fic discussion! I didn't answer many of the questions posed in this fic because I want to address them in later fics (that I hope to write sooner than seven months later haha!)
> 
> I hope the foreshadowing worked in this fic too ;D I had a lot of fun with it!
> 
> Thank you so much for reading! And, if you wish to learn more about Arkanis, Aetheria, Taygeta, the Great Mother and the fate awaiting Kylo with the Matriarch Dalla Mitaka, follow me here on tumblr @lady-starkiller OR follow me on twitter @LadySt4rkiller
> 
> Hope you enjoyed the fic! And may the Great Mother walk with you. Always. <3


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